RESEARCH ABROAD IN THE TIME OF COVID


A U.S. Army scientist's plans for her exchange program assignment in the Czech Republic get upended by the pandemic.


by Cathy VanderMaarel M


oving to a foreign country can be a difficult and anxiety-inducing experience because of language barriers, different customs, new colleagues and many other factors. A global pandemic isn’t usually one of those—until now.


Army research chemist Dr. Irene MacAllister arrived in the Czech Republic for a yearlong tour on Feb. 19, just weeks before the country declared a state of emer- gency in response to the spread of the coronavirus throughout Europe.


A BUMPY LANDING MacAllister spent a brief time handling some administrative matters at the U.S. Embassy in Prague before heading to Hradec Králové, about 70 miles east of the capital, for her assignment on the faculty of military health sciences at the Czech Republic's University of Defense.


“Luckily, I had arranged a number of things before leaving the U.S., and all the intense planning—and to some degree ‘over-planning’—before my actual arrival paid off,” MacAllister said. “I have incredibly supportive Czech peers, including one colleague who had had a past research assignment in the U.S. and who knows exactly what it’s like to arrive alone in a foreign country. She had prearranged an apartment for me which turned to be in an ideal location.”


But even over-planning didn’t prepare MacAllister for what the pandemic would bring. She’s the first Army employee to participate in the Engineer and Scientist Exchange Program in the Czech Republic, and the only American at the facility


70 Army AL&T Magazine Winter 2021


UNEXPECTED FRIEND


Dr. Irene MacAllister enjoys riding her bicycle in the Hradec Forest as a break from her research on the development of a vaccine against the bacterium Francisella tularensis. (Photo courtesy of MacAllister)


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