Alissa Greenwald, a cancer researcher at the Weizmann Institute of Science, had been planning to move to Toronto’s Mount Sinai Hospital this fall, where she was offered a post as a principal investigator, when her lab was hit in the barrage of Iranian missiles last month.
The move is still underway, but the bombings make it harder for her to leave, she says. “Leaving when things are going well is easier…Leaving in the wake of destruction and loss – emotionally, it’s harder.”
In the early hours of the morning of June 15, during the recent Israel-Iran conflict, two Iranian ballistic missiles struck the Weizmann Institute. The damage is estimated at about 2 billion shekels ($819 million). One of the missiles directly hit the cancer research building in which Greenwald worked. “I live pretty close [to the Weizmann Institute]. We felt the impact. I didn’t think to myself…maybe it was my lab,” she recounted.
From up close, the destruction on Greenwald’s side of the building is so complete that the building’s original form is almost indiscernible – structure blends into debris, and the number of floors is anyone’s guess. “There’s nothing left. Our lab was directly at the site of impact. You can’t even go back and look for things. That part of the building just doesn’t exist anymore.”
But beyond the physical destruction of facilities and equipment (such as microscopes, imaging systems, and flow cytometers worth millions of dollars), Greenwald described a sense of loss stemming from the destruction of rare patient samples. “The equipment is expensive but can be replaced,” she explained. “But these [samples] are from people who are often dying, and they choose to give part of themselves for the sake of science and future patients. That generosity cannot be replaced.”
Like many others in the building, the Tirosh lab, where Greenwald worked, was completely destroyed. While most of the lab’s data was preserved through backups, some active experiments hadn’t yet been transferred to online servers. One particularly painful loss involved a postdoc researcher who had spent hundreds of hours developing an antibody panel for imaging tumor samples.
“On the eve of the Iranian strike, she had just completed the first major full experiment… the data hadn’t yet transferred to the server – it was physically on the instrument. So not only did she lose the samples and the entire panel physically, but also the data she had generated,” Greenwald said.
Greenwald’s research focusses on the spatial organization of tumors, particularly brain tumors, generating detailed maps to uncover recurring cellular patterns that could be targeted for therapy.
Originally from Massachusetts, Greenwald made aliyah after earning her undergraduate degree. She completed her master’s and PhD in vascular biology at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and she completed her postdoc in the lab of Prof. Itay Tirosh, where she is now a staff scientist.
“Our lab studies heterogeneity in tumors. Each tumor is made up of a mix of different cancer cell types, each with different behaviours – some are better at invading, some are better at resisting drugs. That diversity is a major obstacle in cancer treatment.
“More recently, new technology has emerged that enables us to profile tumors in intact tissue. Now we can create detailed spatial maps of tumors. We can see which types of cancer cells tend to be next to immune cells or blood vessels, and we’re looking for recurring spatial patterns that can be therapeutically targeted,” she said.
Greenwald says she that she was moved by the resilience of her team and the Weizmann community. “We’re rebuilding,” she said, describing how people have picked up the pieces and resumed work in temporary places. “Everyone is just putting one foot in front of the other and just looking straight ahead… it’s amazing.”
People have found creative ways to continue working, even in non-lab spaces. “Whether it was people joining another lab that’s still intact… or assigning different research groups to seminar rooms and conference rooms,” she said.
Reflecting on the totality of the damage, Greenwald said, “it’s not just a building – it’s years of work, relationships, memories. Losing it in an instant, feels very violating and disorienting.”
That sense of violation, Greenwald says, stems from her view that science in general and cancer research in particular should transcend geopolitical conflict. While science and technology can have military applications, Greenwald views her work and the cancer research community more broadly as focused on understanding disease and improving human health, far removed from the realm of warfare. “I’ve always thought of science as a great unifier,” she said. “I sort of think of Weizmann and also our research place as a safe haven… like a holy place for science, a sanctuary.”
