A FAMILY AFFAIR FOR DONNA AMBROSINO '70, TORI '01, MICHAELA '10, & SAM MARTIN '12
A LEGACY OF LEARNING IN THE SCIENCES STORY BY REBECCA DELANEY
Helping others through science and medicine is a family affair for the Ambrosino/Martin family. Donna Ambrosino ’70 P ’01, ’10, ’12 and her husband Howard Martin, modeled successful medical careers for their three daughters, who—each in her own way—follow in their footsteps. Donna has had an illustrious career in science and medicine, but she says a career in science wasn’t on her radar in high school. “When I graduated from Thayer, I was really hoping to be a sports announcer,” she says. One college interviewer didn’t agree with her career choice, but Harvard didn’t mind and she matriculated there. While at Harvard she says she enjoyed all her classes, but ultimately science began to pique her interest. “Science always interested me. My father was a doctor, and it was something that enticed me.” After she left medical school she assumed she would work as a clinician— seeing pediatric patients, like her father. “Never did I dream of what I would end up doing,” she says. She did see patients at Boston Children’s Hospital, but Donna worked primarily as a researcher focused on immunology and the development of medicines for twenty years. This led to her next career as the first female Executive Director of Massachusetts Biologic Laboratories (MassBiologics), an institution that was founded in 1895. “I had the opportunity to oversee 400 people and develop medicines from idea to development, to manufacturing, to reaching the patient,” she says. Two products she helped develop will soon be available to patients—Rabishield (a monoclonal antibody for the prevention of rabies) and Zinplava (a monoclonal antibody for the prevention of C. Difficile disease). “This was all very exciting, and yet way different than being a sports announcer,” she says.
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Thayer Magazine Winter / Spring 2017
After 13 years at MassBiologics, she moved to ClearPath Vaccines, where she is the Chief Medical Officer. ClearPath works with biopharmaceutical companies to help accelerate product development. Here, Donna is working on a vaccine to prevent hospital-acquired infections. At Thayer Donna says her favorite teacher was Betty Bailey—not in the classroom but on the basketball court. “I never had Betty for English, but what she taught me about sports, teams, and leadership was probably as important to my future as was my understanding of biology and chemistry.” Donna’s eldest daughter, Tori Martin ’01, is a pediatric gastroenterologist at MassGeneral Hospital for Children. When she’s not seeing patients, she teaches at Harvard Medical School and conducts research on the developing infant microbiome and its potential role in gastrointestinal food allergic diseases. Tori’s sister, Sam ’12, is a first-year medical student at UMass Medical School. Michaela ’10, is a first-year law student at Boston College Law School. Michaela was a Biology major at Bowdoin, and before starting law school she used her science background from college to work on a medical device defense case while working at a Boston law firm. Tori credits her parents as a major influence in her career path. “I was lucky enough to be a child of two brilliant physicians who really loved what they did,” says Tori. Her father, Howard, is an orthopedic surgeon, specializing in the spine. “There was no real pressure to follow their career paths. I grew up watching them, and just thought to myself, ‘what better job is there than helping people be well and get better?’”