New Faculty Profiles showcase GSA members who are establishing their first independent labs. If you’d like to be considered for a profile, please complete this form on the GSA website.

Carolyn Phillips

Gabilan Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences (Since 2015)
University of Southern California
Lab website

Research program:

The Phillips lab studies the mechanisms of RNA silencing in C. elegans. We utilize a broad range of techniques including microscopy, genetics, biochemistry, and high-throughput sequencing to characterize new components of the RNA silencing pathway and to understand how they contribute to proper gene expression. We are also currently exploring how RNA silencing is regulated spatially (i.e. where the RNA silencing complexes localize and how they get there) and how mRNAs are sorted sub-cellularly to promote gene silencing or gene expression.

How has being a member of GSA helped you advance in your career? Why do you think societies like GSA are important? 

I am a huge fan of the GSA meetings because they are one of the few opportunities that graduate students and postdocs get to present their research. As a graduate student in the Dernburg lab, I was selected to give a plenary talk at the 2005 International C. elegans meeting. It was one of my most terrifying moments as a graduate student but also one of the highlights. GSA meetings are also a great place to catch up with old friends and colleagues.

If your position involves teaching, which subjects or courses are you expecting to teach?

I am teaching undergraduate Molecular Biology (transcription, translation, RNA processing, RNA silencing)
graduate level C. elegans genetics, and RNA biology.

Previous training experiences:

– Postdoctoral fellow at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School (Research Advisor: Gary Ruvkun)
– Graduate student in Molecular and Cell Biology at UC Berkeley (Research Advisor: Abby Dernburg)
– Undergraduate student in Biological Sciences at UC Davis (Research Advisor: Michael Seldin)

What do you like to do when you’re not at work?

I love exploring my new city of Los Angeles, especially when it is 75 degrees and sunny in February.

New Faculty Profiles showcase GSA members who are establishing their first independent labs. If you’d like to be considered for a profile, please complete this form on the GSA website.

Jessica Feldman

Assistant Professor (Since 2014)
Stanford University
Lab website

Research program:

In my lab we study how cells become properly patterned during development. In particular, we are currently trying to uncover mechanisms that control the organization of the microtubule cytoskeleton during cell differentiation. All animal cells use the centrosome to organize microtubules into a spindle during mitosis. However, differentiated cells frequently adopt alternative spatial patterns of microtubule organization in order to accommodate specific cell functions. We know very little about the molecules that link microtubules to non-centrosomal sites or about the regulatory mechanisms that control the transition from a centrosome based to non-centrosome based organization. My lab is using the model organism C. elegans to answer these questions.

“I love discovery and being able to have creative thinking be my profession! In addition, helping to inspire a future generation of scientists in incredibly rewarding.” -Jessica Feldman on her favorite part about her research

How has being a member of GSA helped you advance in your career? Why do you think societies like GSA are important? 

The GSA is a fantastic organization that has helped me throughout my career. The continued support of organism specific conferences has had a tremendous impact of my training and professional development. Both the Chlamydomonas meetings that I attended as a graduate student and the C. elegans meeting that I now attend have been so important for learning the latest technologies, having the opportunity to share my research with the community, and getting the opportunity to meet the leaders in my field. In addition, the GSA makes career development a priority and this is clear by the various professional development workshops that are available at meetings.

If your position involves teaching, which subjects or courses are you expecting to teach?

I am teaching a class on cell and developmental biology for undergraduates. This course is designed to teach students how we know what we know rather than just the facts. I am also excited to expose these students for the first time to my favorite paradigms in cell and developmental biology!

Previous training experiences:

Postdoctoral Fellow: Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, WA
Ph.D., Cell Biology: University of California, San Francisco, CA
Bachelor of Arts, Biology: Columbia University, NY

What do you like to do when you’re not at work?

Skiing in the winter and hiking and backpacking in the summer. I also love all water activities.

The Allied Genetics Conference brought seven genetics research communities together in Orlando to share great science and make new scientific connections. Watch the video below to see a few highlights from the meeting.

Last week at The Allied Genetics Conference (TAGC), National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Francis Collins provided an overview of model organism support from his agency. Collins used a new analysis performed by NIH staff to address concerns expressed by many of the model organism researchers gathered at TAGC, particularly a 2015 analysis by Michael Wangler, Keith Yamamoto, and Hugo Bellen that suggested NIH grant support for Drosophila research is declining. The new data, which was made publicly available on the Open Mike blog at the time of his talk, evaluated funding levels for Drosophila, Caenorhabditis elegans, Zebrafish, and Xenopus laevis at NIH since 2008. The key finding is that the award rate for R01 proposals using model organisms is higher than overall R01 award rates.

Figure 1. from Open Mike blog post

In his talk, Collins presented the data above with the conclusion that you’re more likely to be funded at NIH if you use one of these model organisms. However, there are a few caveats. The comparison between model organism grants and award rates across NIH may not be the best control because model organism grants are disproportionately funded by NIGMS, which had a 29.6% award rate in 20151. This means institutes that fund far less model organism research, like NCI (13% award rate), NICHD (11.5% award rate), and NIBIB (12%), decrease the agency-wide award rate to 18%. The data also discounts those who are funded through other mechanisms, such as K and P awards.

Collins also discussed funding of model organism databases, citing the open letter for support of these key resources, which had over 11,000 signatures at the time of his talk. Recognizing the invaluable contribution of these databases to the evolution of Big Data, he discussed ways that they might move forward more efficiently as a part of the Big Data to Knowledge (BD2K) initiative at NIH. While future funding for model organism databases remains uncertain, Collins was clear that changes were on the horizon. Historically, this shared resource has been funded by NHGRI, however, NHGRI Director Eric Greene instructed database leaders to identify new funding sources by 2020 and integrate the organism-specific databases into a single resource. Leaders of the model organism communities and GSA are working together with NIH to identify solutions that will maintain the integrity of the databases and be more cost-efficient.

A group of TAGC attendees concerned about the future of model organism databases took the opportunity to start #saveMODfunding on Twitter.

Come to the outreach booth at the lonely end of the hall, & tell us why MODs are important! #TAGC16 #saveMODfunding pic.twitter.com/ShhKbqMQwT

— Point Mutation (@Point_Mutation) July 14, 2016

#saveMODfunding @GeneticsGSA @thegeneticsgal pic.twitter.com/aqdstcDbXz

— Andrew Kern (@pastramimachine) July 16, 2016

Less database $ will slow #science! #saveMODfunding #TAGC16 @GeneticsGSA pic.twitter.com/9itDOeWb7c

— Masha Evpak (@thegeneticsgal) July 8, 2016

At the end of his talk, Collins urged researchers to continue to ask congress to fund more for fundamental research, arguing that increased, sustainable funding will help maintain support for model organisms, and the biomedical advances that depend on them

Reference:
1. https://report.nih.gov/success_rates/Success_ByIC.cfm

New Faculty Profiles showcase GSA members who are establishing their first independent labs. If you’d like to be considered for a profile, please complete this form on the GSA website.

Steven Zuryn

Group Leader, Stafford Fox Senior Research Fellow
Queensland Brain Institute,
The University of Queensland, Australiae
Lab website

Research program:

One of our main focuses is the emerging role of epigenetic mechanisms that help preserve correct cell function. We have recently found that specific types of histone methylation ensure robust neuron function in C. elegans in the face of stressful conditions. Our goal is to understand how, and be able to predict outcomes under alternative epigenetic criteria that may influence disease progression.

We are also interested in understanding fundamental aspects of neural mitochondrial biology. To do this, we are developing new genetic tools that will allow us probe mitochondrial function in vivo.

We are very interested in recruiting more graduate students and postdocs. We have some very exciting projects that we are currently pursuing and wish to attract investigators that share our high levels of excitement and ambition. The Institute here is an amazing place for students and postdocs, and it is set in a really exotic location with many things to do outside of the lab!

“Creativity. We are lucky in the fact that our job allows us to be creative every single day. This should not be taken for granted and I feel we are privileged in that respect. Whether it is generating new and perhaps revolutionary ideas, or creating ways around small everyday technical hurdles that are encountered in the lab.” -Steven Zuryn on his favorite part about his research

How has being a member of GSA helped you advance in your career? Why do you think societies like GSA are important? 

GSA membership and regular attendance of the GSA sponsored International C. elegans Meeting has allowed me to interact with the best geneticists in the world. The importance of the feedback on my projects and ideas has been invaluable to my career. Moreover, I was fortunate enough to present my projects at these conferences, and I believe this was very important for eventual publication.

Previous training experiences:

Postdoctoral fellow: 2009-2015, Dr. Sophie Jarriault Lab, Institut Génétique Biologie Moléculaire Cellulaire, Strasbourg, France

PhD: 2008, Prof. Paul Ebert’s Lab, University of Queensland, Australia

BSc (hons 1st class): 2003, University of Queensland, Australia

What do you like to do when you’re not at work?

Relax! Snowboarding, traveling, camping.

New Faculty Profiles showcase GSA members who are establishing their first independent labs. If you’d like to be considered for a profile, please complete this form on the GSA website.

Michael Wangler

Assistant Professor (starting July 2016)
Department of Molecular and Human Genetics
Baylor College of Medicine
Lab website

Research program:

The overall long-term goal of Wangler Lab is to improve our understanding of the molecular pathogenesis of Mendelian disease by merging clinical observations, genomics and model organisms. We are currently engaged in three major efforts:

1) Gene Discovery in Mendelian Disorders

We have been involved in identifying disease genes for Mendelian disorders. Past efforts have included a broad list of single-gene disorders including COL11A1 in fibrochondrogenesis a severe neonatal bone phenotype (Tompson et al., 2010), de novo truncating mutations in AHDC1 in intellectual disability and speech delay, the Xia-Gibbs syndrome (Xia et al., 2014) and ACTG2 in visceral myopathy (Wangler and Beaudet, 2015; Wangler et al., 2014).

2) Model Organisms and the Molecular Pathogenesis of Mendelian Disorders

One of the most urgent problems in medical genetics is understanding variants from clinical sequencing. We began developing an approach to use Drosophila for cross-species studies of conserved genes to aid in understanding clinical sequencing findings. We work in Drosophila and simultaneously with genomic databases from patients with rare disorders. One of our efforts led to a merger of a forward genetic screen that resulted in diagnosis for 6 previously undiagnosed families (Yamamoto et al., 2014), and this approach was outlined in an article in Genetics (Wangler et al., 2015). We have recently developed an efficient pipeline using Drosophila melanogaster to screen nearly ANY conserved gene and variant of interest from genomic sequencing studies. We have successfully applied these tools to solve cases in the Centers for Mendelian Genomics (www.mendelian.org), and we are currently applying this pipeline to de novo missense variants from the Simons Simplex Collection as well as unsolved cases from the Undiagnosed Diseases Network (UDN).

3) Mendelian Disorders of the Peroxisome and Organelle Dynamics

Our lab has developed a Drosophila research program and a clinical research study focused on peroxisomal genes. This work has identified unique phenotypes such as a late-onset ataxia associated with PEX16 (Bacino et al., 2015) and cases of infantile encephalopathy due to DNM1L mutations. The study of these mutations in flies has allowed us to understand loss and gain of function alleles in peroxisomal disease and broadened our understanding of these phenotypes and their biological basis.

In summary Wangler lab aims to elucidate the pathogenic molecular mechanisms of Mendelian disorders by merging model organisms and human genomics.

“Merging model organisms and clinical genetics is always interesting. I literally have days where I work with unique strains of flies representing mutations in particular aspects of cellular machinery and then on the same day walk over to clinic and see a patient with a rare disease in which the same process is affected. If we can understand it in the fly we can make more headway in the clinic and offer more to our patients. How many people get to have experiences like that?” -Michael Wangler on his favorite part about his research

How has being a member of GSA helped you advance in your career? Why do you think societies like GSA are important? 

To me the GSA represents the fundamental value of sound genetics in biological research. So often in the world of human genetics and clinical genomics, the first principles of genetics can become lost in terminology. I follow the GSA on Twitter and that link on social media has connected me to numerous articles and resources from the model organism communities. I’m consistently brought back to the fundamentals of genetics by looking through GENETICS and G3 and I hope to see more of the insights from these efforts migrating into the clinic in my career.

Previous training experiences:

1996-2000 Bachelors of Science (B.S.), University of California San Diego

2000-2001 Masters of Science (M.S.), Division of Biology, University of California San Diego. Research Mentor Ethan Bier

2001-2003 Medical Student at University of New Mexico School of Medicine, Albuquerque

2003-2004 Research Fellow, Doris Duke Clinical Research Fellowship for Medical Students at Washington University in St Louis. Research Mentors Michael DeBaun and Louis Muglia

2004-2006 Medical Doctorate (M.D.), Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas

2006-2009 Pediatric Resident, Baylor College of Medicine

2009-2011 Medical Genetics Fellowship, Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine

2011-2016 Non-tenure track Assistant Professor, Department of Molecular and Human Genetics, Baylor College of Medicine, Research Mentor Hugo Bellen

What do you like to do when you’re not at work?

Triathalons and spending time with my kids (occasionally showing them the flies)

Save

Update: This letter of support received 11,078 signatures and has been presented to Dr. Francis Collins. Thank you for your interest. Continue to follow GenestoGenomes.org for updates on this issue. 

Leaders of several model organism communities, working with the Genetics Society of America (GSA), have come together to write a Statement of Support for the model organism databases (MODs) and to urge NIH to revise its proposal to reduce funding for MODs. We ask all scientists who value the community-specific nature of the MODs to sign this ‘open letter’ found below.

Dear Dr. Collins and NIH Institute Directors,

We are amongst the more than ten thousand NIH-supported researchers who study ‘model organisms’ in order to improve human health and make fundamental discoveries of biomedical significance. Model organisms—including budding yeast, fruit flies, nematode worms, zebrafish and rodents—have had an incalculable impact on the current knowledge of biological mechanisms and their translation to treat human disease.  Recognizing the power and efficiency of model organism research, NIH spends more than $5 billion annually on grants that center around these organisms, including $1 billion on non-mammalian models.

Model Organism Databases (MODs) are the critical infrastructure that underpins these studies. Such databases—including FlyBase, WormBase, Saccharomyces Genome Database, ZFIN, Mouse Genome Database, and Rat Genome Database, along with Gene Ontology (GO)—are much more than assemblages of genomic information. They serve as hubs of collective community knowledge, integrating and curating the ever-increasing literature. They develop and implement tools for analysis of complex datasets, pioneering approaches to ‘big data’ that (as with the genome projects in the 1990s) are then applied to human biology. Moreover, through their open and easily accessible web interfaces, they are the chief portals by which this information is shared and disseminated with researchers, students, and the worldwide scientific community.

As individual researchers, we use MODs daily to leverage this accumulated knowledge to drive our own cutting-edge discoveries. We especially rely on the MOD’s high-quality, up-to-date, and comprehensive nature in collating myriad data that are impossible for researchers alone to access. Such community-driven efforts are in part why model organisms have been so successful in advancing knowledge.  Without the systematic organization of the MODs, each of our research efforts would be drastically impeded and in some cases impossible, slowing the pace of discovery and reducing the efficient use of NIH funding.

We enthusiastically support the initiative to integrate elements of the existing MODs and to increase accessibility of the information contained therein, especially to medical researchers. However, we are deeply concerned by reported plans to reduce overall support for MODs themselves.  Each MOD collects, curates, analyzes, and disseminates unique sets of data that reflect the unique biology and specific research usage of their model organism. We strongly advocate for the continuation of adequate and sustained funding to the individual MODs to maintain essential and species-unique information and to respond to new data initiatives for their communities. We further encourage inclusion of MOD community representatives in future discussions regarding the MODs. Together, this structure will provide the strongest foundation for future advances in our understanding of fundamental biology and human disease.

We applaud NIH leaders’ recent affirmation of basic science as the ‘bedrock of progress’ in biomedicine. Model organisms have long been at the heart of the basic science portfolio, and research with them is more relevant than ever in addressing cutting-edge problems, from the complex relationships between genotype, environment, and phenotype, to understanding the structure and function of the brain, to creating efficient and manipulable human disease models. In particular, deciphering the role of disease-relevant genetic variants increasingly depends on model organism-based functional studies. Moreover, model organism research fosters the unanticipated discoveries that regularly revolutionize biology.

MODs form the scaffold on which these key scientific advances have been and will continue to be made. At less than $20 million annual support, MODs are highly cost-effective resources that save researchers countless hours of effort extracting, collating, and computing information. They also facilitate access of human geneticists and clinical researchers to the rich functional information obtained from model organisms. NIH’s support for the MODs over the last two decades has enabled a bevy of pivotal discoveries that lie at the true heart of the NIH mission. We urge you to continue the far-sighted policy of support for vital research infrastructure.

Relevant Reading:

Funding for model organism databases in trouble 

New Faculty Profiles showcase GSA members who are establishing their first independent labs. If you’d like to be considered for a profile, please complete this form on the GSA website.

Phillip Jordan

Assistant Professor (since 2013)
Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Department
Bloomberg School of Public Health
Lab website

Research program:

• Assessment of the functions of Structural Maintenance of Chromosomes (SMC) complexes
• Determining the roles of Aurora and Polo-like kinases during meiosis
  ***Looking to recruit a postdoc!

“Discovery.” -Philip Jordan on his favorite part about his work

How has being a member of GSA helped you advance in your career? Why do you think societies like GSA are important? 

During my PhD studies, the GSA gave me opportunities to attend and present at conferences that would not have been possible without their support. This enabled me to form contacts and collaborations at a very early stage in my career. The GSA is an excellent resource for career development. The GENETICS and G3 journals are excellent resources for me and my students.

If your position involves teaching, which subjects or courses are you expecting to teach?

• Genome Integrity
• Reproductive Biology
• Genomics for Public Health

Previous training experiences:

Postdoc – The Jackson Laboratory, Bar Harbor, Maine, USA.

Postdoc – Genome Damage and Stability Center, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK.

PGCertHE – University of Sussex, Brighton, UK.

PhD – Institute of Cell Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK.

Bachelor in Biotechnology (Hns) – Flinders University of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia

What do you like to do when you’re not at work?

Spending time with family, cooking a BBQ with a beer in hand, watching and playing soccer.

Rotunda, Cannon House Office Building. Photo Credit: Chloe Poston

The House Appropriations Committee completed a review of its fiscal year (FY) 2017 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Activities (CJS) spending bill, which provides the budget for the National Science Foundation (NSF). This bill includes language that supports the peer review process carried out by NSF in its funding process. The committee also refrained from any mention of Directorate-level funding at NSF (which would effectively set spending priorities for specific areas of science), instead allowing continued autonomy for the agency to select the scientific proposals it supports. As a push to encourage transparency, the bill directs NSF to ensure that award abstracts are written for a lay audience and include a statement about how the project relates to national interest. This particular provision is not novel; similar language is found in the America COMPETES Act of 2015 and the Scientific Research in the National Interest Act.

Despite the budget request of $7.9 billion from the agency, the House CJS bill sets the budget for NSF at just $7.4 billion (-$57 million). While this reduction would allow for a $46 million increase in research and related activities (which funds investigator-initiated research), it calls for a $113 million funding cut in Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction. The House CJS bill is a notable departure from the Senate CJS spending bill, which provides $7.5 billion for NSF, but allocates the full funding increase above FY 2016 to design and construct three research class vessels for the Gulf of Mexico and the East and West coasts, leaving no room for a boost in research and related funding.

***LEGISLATIVE ACTION ALERT! Click here to send a letter to your representative urging their support of NSF.

Agencies evaluate shared research resources

Earlier this year, the Division of Biological Infrastructure in the NSF BIO directorate announced that its Collections in Scientific Biological Research (CSBR) would be on a hiatus for the 2016 application cycle. This announcement raised concerns in the GSA community because CSBR funds widely-used model organism stock centers and databases – critical resources that speed research advances and improve research reproducibility. In a May 25th statement, BIO Assistant Director Jim Olds announced that the program would be placed on a biennial award cycle, with proposals accepted in 2017. This shift may have resulted from the outpouring of public criticism and comments underscoring the importance of these shared resources. Meanwhile at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) has released a Request for Information on the need for and support of research resources for the Biomedical Research Community. GSA’s formal response highlighted the importance of shared research resources across the genetics community, and the broad impact of investments in stock centers and databases. Read the full response here.

ACTION ALERT

• To share examples of the benefits of CSBR, potential metrics by which to evaluate CSBR, or other comments, send email to DBICBSR@nsf.gov. While there is no official deadline, comments shared in the near future are more likely to be incorporated in the evaluation process
• To submit comments on shared research resources to NIGMS, send email to nigmsresource@mail.nih.gov by June 3, 2016

GE Crop Study releases final report 

The National Academy of Sciences released its final report on genetically engineered (GE) crops, Genetically Engineered Crops: Experiences and Prospects. The report, a result of  a review of over 900 publications, 80 speakers at public meetings and webinars, and more than 700 comments from members of public, found that GE crops on the market have no adverse effects on human health or biodiversity. The study reported that GE crops have varied economic impact as a result of external socioeconomic factors like the cost of seed and government support for broad dissemination of seeds. The 300+ page report is intended to encourage dialogue between advocates on both sides of the issue. In addition to reviewing existing GE crops, the study also developed a framework to analyze new GE products before they enter the market. Such analyses rely on –omics technology to compare GE products to conventionally bred crops. As for labeling of foods containing GE crops, the committee supported the argument for the sake of transparency, but reiterated that there is no safety concern with GE crops on the market.  “We must move away from sweeping generalizations about GE crops and treat each one as its own entity,” said Fred Gould (North Carolina State University), the study committee Chair. Learn more about the GE crop study here.

Sweeping wage reform impacts postdocs in science

In late May, the Department of Labor released its revisions to the Fair Labor Standards Act. The updated rule requires that postdocs who earn less than $47,476 per year are eligible for overtime when they work more than 40 hours a week. This change, effective December 1, 2016, was embraced by NIH Director Francis Collins in a Huffington Post op-ed coauthored with U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez. The new baseline salary for postdocs funded directly by NIH will meet the threshold set by the new rule. Catch up on this issue and its implications here.

Photo Credit: Ed Brown

Back in December, we wrote here about a proposed rule from the U.S. Department of Labor that would mandate that postdocs earning less than $50,440 per year would be eligible for overtime pay at 1.5 times their hourly rate. This week, the Department of Labor released its revisions to the Fair Labor Standards Act. The changes will take effect December 1, 2016. Here, we summarize what this means for research labs, institutions, and the estimated 37,000-40,000 researchers affected by these changes.

The Final Rule announced this week looks a little different than the proposal first described last fall. In summary:

• Salaried workers who are not exempt and who earn less than $47,476 per year are eligible for overtime when they work more than 40 hours in a week.
• Postdocs are not exempt and are therefore subject to the changes in the rule.
• The salary threshold overtime eligibility will rise every three years to keep up with inflation.

The National Institutes of Health and Department of Labor worked together to reach clear guidelines for postdocs. U.S. Secretary of Labor, Thomas E. Perez and NIH Director Francis Collins published a joint op-ed in the Huffington Post, announcing NIH’s plan to raise the baseline salary for postdocs funded directly by the agency through individual fellowships to $47,476, timed to coincide with the rule’s announcement. The annual increase ranges from hundreds to thousands of dollars for eligible postdocs, depending on seniority. Postdocs are now paid $43,692 (first year), $45,444 (second year), and $47,268 (third year) from individual fellowships. It’s unclear whether NIH will use the new salary threshold as a baseline for their seniority-based pay scale or if seniority will no longer be considered. Collins and Perez acknowledge the challenge this change would impose, but asserted that higher salaries were a step in the right direction, and create an “opportunity to encourage more of our brightest young minds to consider choosing careers in science.”

Not all postdocs will be eligible for overtime. The new overtime rule only applies to postdocs who are full-time researchers and do not participate in teaching and training activities as a part of their position. This largely excludes postdocs in the humanities, who regularly teach courses during their postdoctoral studies, and thus would not receive any change in their pay. As for the sciences, this loophole could lead to some post-docs being re-classified with titles that suggest they are lecturers or instructors, thereby making them exempt from the overtime rule. It’s unclear whether the hands-on training that postdocs provide to graduate and undergraduate students in research labs will be sufficient for exemption based on the teaching exception. This will likely be decided at the institutional level.

No doubt a function of the soon-to-change White House administration, the Department of Labor will implement the rule sooner rather than later. Despite calls from organizations like the American Association of Medical Colleges and American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology for a phased-in approach, the rule will be fully implemented on December 1, 2016. In a fact sheet directed toward institutions of higher education, the Department of Labor outlined three options for universities to become compliant with the rule: raise the salary of non-exempt postdocs above the new threshold, pay postdocs overtime for hours worked beyond the standard 40 hour work week, or evaluate workloads to reduce the need for overtime.

The nature of scientific research is such that the last option is not a realistic one where postdocs are concerned. Whether institutions decide to give postdocs a raise or pay overtime, the looming question remains: Where is the extra money going to come from?   Funding agencies could increase award amounts to reflect the new exemption threshold; however, budget negotiations for fiscal year 2017 have largely held funding for the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation flat for investigator-initiated research, making this an unlikely option in the next year. Without more funding to offset these costs, Principal Investigators (PIs) will need to fund these raises or hours of overtime based on budgets calculated prior to the new threshold announcement. This means that for at least the first year, some PIs will be forced to reduce the size of their research groups, taking on fewer graduate students or dropping existing postdocs.

Although Collins and Perez pledge to “work closely with leaders in the postdoc and research communities to find creative solutions to ensure a smooth transition,” with major changes in such little time, we can expect a few bumps along the road.

What are your thoughts on the new overtime rule? Please share in the comment section below.