Recent Posts

Careers in SynBio: Startup companies

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As part of our continuing series on future careers in plant science I spoke to Dr. Ran Chao, Co-founder of LifeFoundry, a startup company aiming to expedite research and reduce cost in synthetic biology, about making the transition from graduate research to entrepreneur and what he looks for in new…

Reflections on my move from academia to a startup

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Guest post by Christy Gault My interest in agricultural biotechnology began in an unlikely place. In an undergraduate Wetland Ecology course, we took a field trip to a small patch of wilderness in rural upstate New York. Canoeing past dense vegetation under a brilliant blue sky, I felt a sense of…

Know thyself: the guide to shaping your career trajectory

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How the power in knowing one's self can positively shape a happy and fruitful career-life trajectory Guest post by Emily Wrenbeck I was fortunate to have an excellent graduate school experience in the Chemical Engineering Department at Michigan State University. Under the mentorship of Tim Whitehead,…

Get the Ball Rolling! Applying and Interviewing for Careers in Industry

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Guest post by Guillaume Beaudoin, Scientist, Conagen Inc. About one year has gone by since I had begun seriously looking for a job to end my postdoctoral experience at the University of Florida. I had read all the doom and gloom: how the ratio of the number of faculty positions to PhDs is forever…

Careers in Plant Synthetic Biology Part III: Using and Running a DNA Foundry

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In part III of the blog series looking at future directions in Plant Synthetic Biology, I caught up with members of the Earlham DNA Foundry to find out about how anyone in research might benefit from a Foundry as well as careers in managing facilities and requirements for wet-lab positions. A…

Careers in Plant Synthetic Biology Part I: Introducing the modern steam mill

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This post is part of a series looking at careers in Plant Synthetic Biology leading up to the 1st ASPB Plant SynBio meeting on the 7-9 Aug 2019, in San Jose CA. Follow the PlantSynbio2019 Twitter account for updates about the event. Looking back 200 years in time to the Northwest…

How come approaching questions knowing little helped my career a lot?

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Guest post by Ron Milo, Professor, Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel https://www.weizmann.ac.il/pla... When I worked on analyzing biological networks I thought it was a disgrace I don’t know more about the relevant subject. Yet what we…

A new approach to graduate professional development; lessons learned from a leadership retreat

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If you had 48 free hours, what are the odds you’d spend them at a leadership retreat? Prior to my own experience I would have said “not likely”. After all, I’m a second-year graduate student with coursework, experiments, and TA responsibilities clamoring for my time. I’m also a member of the…

Careers in Plant Synthetic Biology Part II: Computational Synthetic Biology

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In part II of the series looking at careers in Plant Synthetic Biology I reached out to Valentin Zulkower who works as the Software Manager of the Edinburgh Genome Foundry (EGF), Scotland, UK, to find out about computational jobs. In what ways can computational biologists contribute to synthetic…