Secret Life of Scientists and Engineers
Ina Vandebroek: To Boldly Go...
Season 2009 Episode 28 | 1m 53s | Video has closed captioning.
Ina Vandebroek: To Boldly Go...
Aired: 11/05/09
Problems Playing Video? | Closed Captioning
Secret Life of Scientists and Engineers
Season 2009 Episode 28 | 1m 53s | Video has closed captioning.
Ina Vandebroek: To Boldly Go...
Aired: 11/05/09
Problems Playing Video? | Closed Captioning
(typewriter sounds) - Well, when I was a child, I really loved Star Trek.
I was always glued to the TV, just watching the adventures of Spock and Kirk to boldly go where no men has gone before to seek out new lives and new civilizations.
As a aetna botanist, I go out to far and remote areas in the tropics to study how local cultures use medicinal plants for healing it's something that is similar to watching star Trek.
And I think I go into the fields and meet new people and see how they are living and what they're doing and how they are healing themselves with plants.
12.5% of all living plant species are currently threatened with extinction.
A lot of these communities, they do not have healthcare By recording that knowledge about plants which is often the only available kind of healthcare that people have.
I prevent it from getting lost.
From all the results from the research, we would make a guidebook of the medicinal plants of that area and their uses.
As a aetna botanist you're really becoming a part of their life.
These are all new worlds to me and worlds that I can visit to boldly go where no woman has gone before.