An interview with Sarah Köster, Professor of physics: « the best job I can imagine! »
Sarah Köster is a biophysics professor at the University of Göttingen, Germany. She has been awarded the Emmy Noether Distinction of the European Physical Society (EPS) for her seminal contributions to the physics of biological cells and biopolymers, in particular for the understanding of intermediate filaments, and her impressive ability in teaching and recruiting women scientists in her field of research.
Sarah Köster studied physics at the University of Ulm and received her PhD from the University of Göttingen in 2006. Her thesis was awarded the Berliner-Ungewitter-Award of the Göttingen physics faculty as well as the Otto-Hahn-Medal of the Max-Planck-Society. In 2008, after two years of postdoctoral work at Harvard University, she returned to Göttingen as an assistant professor. In 2010 she was awarded the Helene-Lange-Award of the EWE-Foundation. In 2011 she was promoted to tenured associate professor and in 2017 to full professor in the faculty of physics at the University of Göttingen, where she leads the research group Cellular Biophysics at the Institute of X-Ray Physics. In 2016 she received an ERC Consolidator grant. She is leading a large research group in Göttingen, employing a high proportion of young women scientists several of whom have been awarded prices and fellowships in turn.
Below is an interview between Sarah Köster [SK] and Luc Bergé [LB], Chair of the Equal Opportunity Committee of EPS.
LB: At what point in your education did you consider a career in physics?
SK: I actually don’t really remember at what point in high school I decided to study physics. I always liked physics and mathematics in school, but also considered studying music or languages. It was clear to me, however, already before starting university that I wanted to eventually specialize on biological physics – a field that at the time was not yet as established as it is today.
I studied physics in Ulm, Germany (and deliberately not biophysics, which seemed to involve too little mathematics and theoretical physics from my point of view), where I also started a PhD in experimental physics and worked on biological polymers. After the first two years, I spent seven months at Boston University, working on a second project in parallel and, above all, starting to build up an international network with other scientists from which I still benefit today. I returned to Germany to finish my PhD in Göttingen, to where the research group had moved in the meantime and then returned to Boston, this time to Harvard University, for a two-year-postdoc. This time was extremely important for me, from a scientific, professional and personal point of view. I was then very lucky and was offered one of the few tenure track assistant professor positions in Germany for which I moved back to Göttingen. Only a bit more than two years later I got promoted to a tenured associate professor position and then just two years ago to full professor.
Although this all may seem like a straightforward and predetermined career path in retrospect, it actually wasn’t the case at that time. I rather took my decisions one at a time and even during my postdoc time, I still considered alternative career paths, for example in industry or consulting. I have to say, though, that I am very happy about my decision to become a professor – it’s really the best job I can imagine!
LB: Did you find a resistance to girls succeeding in science?
SK: Personally, not really, actually. The (very few) discriminating comments by, e.g., teachers or professors, were never a real problem for me. I can imagine, however, that such situations could discourage girls from pursuing a career in science and it’s good to see that working in the natural sciences is becoming more and more common for women.
Being one of very few women in physics actually helped in some situations, just because you stand out in a way. Looking at my situation now, I believe that my female colleagues and I have to do more committee work than men, just because there are typically quotas, which are above the actual number of women professors.
LB: Do you believe that physics should positively discriminate in favour of women?
SK: I don’t think we should have something like quotas for filling academic positions with women – I believe that no woman wants to feel like she got a job because she is female. I do think, however, it helps that, in cases where women are equally qualified, they are favored, just in order to increase the percentage of female physics professors on a long run and providing role models to students.
LB: Do you have advices to girls who wish to start a career in physics?
SK: Girls are as capable as boys to do mathematics or physics. They may, however, on average, be more careful and thus more hesitant. Of course, physics is difficult and it is a lot of hard work to succeed in science. It’s also a lot of (very fun!) team work, though, and very rewarding. If girls (or boys) like physics, they should give it a try. You are typically good at things that you like doing (and vice versa)!
