The GSA team welcomes Vincent Price, PhD, as the new Early Career Leadership Program Editor! Vincent is a talented editor with years of experience under his belt as a consultant and published author, alongside a number of years teaching English and French at secondary and post-secondary levels.

Can you tell us a little bit about your background and your career trajectory? 

I was born and raised in Vicksburg, Mississippi—a city that people know because of its role in the American Civil War or because they drive through it on their way to a more exciting location. My two older sisters and I were raised by our mother in a literate environment. In just about every room you entered, there was a bookshelf spilling over with books or word games. From my mom’s attention to detail and presentation to the multiple educators in the family, we were raised to represent ourselves and our people well in whatever we do. I took to enjoying words and writing, eventually becoming an English teacher. With my BA in English, I spent five years teaching English and French in my hometown, and I even took a few students abroad to see the world beyond Mississippi. 

Representation was important to me, and my five years of teaching showed me that African American literary representation could be stronger in the English classroom. So, I entered graduate school determined to find a way of bringing more African American literature into the classroom. Through the pursuit of my master’s and doctoral degrees, I grew as a thinker, teacher, and writer. My perspectives on teaching and writing shifted, thereby evolving how I approached them. After graduate school, I was both a classroom teacher and a copy editor/writing consultant, encouraging others to read like writers and write with the reader in mind. I’m currently an assistant professor at the University of Central Arkansas where I train future educators to enter the classroom. My editing business, which started during my doctoral journey, has expanded to offer multiple avenues of quality writing support to graduate students and professionals. Now, between my role as a scholar and a writing consultant, I’m finding fantastic opportunities to sharpen my writing for publication and help others do the same.

What are you most looking forward to working on in your new role?

Writing makes me smile. Talking about writing makes me smile even more. It’s my zone. Therefore, when I’m in a position where I get to discuss writing with others, what could be better? The teacher in me is looking forward to showing others how to strengthen their writing and have fun while doing it. I’m looking forward to the smiles of burgeoning confidence and the moments of newfound clarity from the members I’ll be working with. (And yes, I ended the sentence with an infinitive!)

What about teaching writing and editing do you find most inspiring?

I entered into the editing/writing consulting business partly because I realized that some people lack confidence in their writing. Producing strong writing isn’t beyond them; they simply need support. Some folks even need the “okay” to break the limiting “rules” that they learned in school. I enjoy watching the confidence grow in writers. With each piece of writing, they become stronger not only in how they express themselves on paper but also in how proud they are of their growth and accomplishments.

What’s one piece of advice every early career scientist should hear?

Don’t be afraid to experiment in your writing. If you never try new things, your writing won’t grow. So as you read, read like a writer by paying attention to what other writers do. That way, you can then try it out for yourself.

What would surprise your undergraduate self about your career path so far?

“What?! You’re not still teaching in high school?! What?! You’re a published author?! WHAT?! And you have your own business where you get PAID to edit?!” My undergraduate self then faints.

How have your mentors played a role in your career journey?

Multiple people in my life have spoken me into where I am now. From family members and friends to teachers, professors, and colleagues, folks have encouraged me to keep going and to keep pushing the limit. I oftentimes did not see what they saw, but ended up right where they said I would be. I not only am grateful for what they saw and still see. I welcome it.

What professional accomplishment are you most proud of?

I am most proud of the longevity of my editing business, which I started out of financial need. Six years later, it’s still going strong, cruising on word-of-mouth advertising. It had humble beginnings for sure, but along the way, I’ve grown as an editor, writer, and business owner. I never would have imagined it.

What’s your idea of a perfect weekend?

My perfect weekend would be a weekend away on a Floridian coast with my wife and family. The sun is shining, the smiles are beaming, and the mood is full of joy. If this is a perfect weekend, money would not be a concern of course. So we would explore the food and activities of our surroundings to our hearts’ content.

In the Decoding Life series, we talk to geneticists with diverse career paths, tracing the many directions possible after research training. This series is brought to you by the GSA Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee. 

Although training in genetics is highly transferable, transitioning out of academia can present a lot of challenges. We interviewed Dr. Tara Zeynep Baris to discuss her transition out of academia and into a career in data science. Dr. Baris received her PhD in Evolutionary Genomics at the University of Miami. Desiring flexibility and a diverse workload, Dr. Tara Zeynep Baris pursued data science through a postdoctoral training opportunity with Insight Data Science. She then transitioned to a position in research and development for Nielsen, an audience data analytics company for media platforms. Dr. Baris is currently a Senior Data Scientist with the Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution–Ocean (C4IR Ocean), which operates under the World Economic Forum. Tara shares her experience working in the world of data science and how her PhD training in genomics prepared her for this career path.

How did you decide to transition out of academia?

It wasn’t an easy decision. I love research and having the freedom to explore something to the end. However, I wanted flexibility in where I would live and the ability to try different opportunities until I found the right fit. In contrast, most academics have to follow open positions and become experts in one research domain. Of course you can always learn new things and change slightly, but there isn’t a ton of flexibility as you won’t get a full-time position in an area of research that is completely different from your background. 

What were the biggest challenges in transitioning to industry?

In academia, especially as a PhD student, you’re in a learning position. So, when you make mistakes, you aren’t usually held responsible for the financial implications. You just move on and learn. This isn’t always the case when you work for a company. You could potentially cost your company an important client or contract. In industry, you will more frequently feel the pressure to get things right without as much space to learn by making mistakes. 

Another difference is in the depth of projects. In research, you have the freedom to explore a topic by reading everything in the literature, looking at the data from different perspectives, and then making conclusions. In industry, you don’t have the time to get that level of depth on every project. This was a bit difficult for me because I was used to being completely immersed in what I was researching, but that’s not necessarily what’s needed in industry. Many times I’ve just scratched the surface before a project ends.

The other main challenge is the interviewing process in industry, which was a whole new world to me. For a PhD or a postdoc position, you might give a talk, then meet with faculty and have some laid back conversations about research. Data science interviews require an insane amount of preparation. I was quizzed and challenged to demonstrate competency in coding and data science-specific skills through separate specialized interviews. This was a stressful process and took more time to prepare for each set of technical interviews. 

What are your day-to-day responsibilities as a data scientist working on the Ocean Data Platform team within C4IR Ocean?

Our team’s focus is on building a platform that makes it easy for different types of users to get access to the data that they need to create a more sustainable ocean, whether that’s industry professionals, policymakers, or researchers. I take on a few different roles on the team. First, I do a lot of user interviews and talk to people who will be using our product to make sure that it meets their needs. Second, I work to understand what data is out there, what formats it exists in, and determine how we can make it more accessible to people. This involves working with different types of databases, including geospatial data sets, and then figuring out what actually can be done with the data. 

I read papers to understand why certain data is useful. Sometimes that involves working with our partners in different research institutions and universities in Norway to understand the downstream value of that data and coding different functions or working on different models that help people use that data. Having a research background is really useful in these cases, especially because people from research and industry have very different ways of communicating. It is sometimes easier for me to communicate with researchers because I understand their language and what’s important to them. For example, I’m collaborating with the University of Tromso on an Environmental DNA project, which has drawn on a lot from my genomics training.

How does your training compare with other industry data scientists?

When I started my first data science position at Nielsen (a TV ratings company) almost everyone on the team had a PhD in either physics, biology, or even fisheries. That was quite a big team compared to where I am now, which has two data scientists and some consultants. The other data scientist I work with now has a background in maritime data but isn’t from a strictly research background. At first it wasn’t an easy transition for me into industry, but I had really supportive team members who helped me bridge the gap between academic training and what is needed in an industry position.

What do you enjoy most about your current position with the Ocean Data Platform?

I like that I do a lot of different things. That’s important for me personally, as I don’t like doing only one thing repetitively. It’s nice that sometimes I spend my days talking to people and other days I concentrate on coding. I also contribute to big-picture ideas about the direction of our product. So, my favorite thing is that I have my hands in a little bit of everything, and I can be in contact with people on other parts of the project because we’re such a small team. For example, I enjoy trying to understand what the data engineers are doing, learning from them, and contributing to their work. 

Has your position within a policy-driven organization improved your communication skills?

I give a lot of presentations that include talking about technical things to non-technical people with a really wide range of expertise. I also present to different industries or government organizations or universities, who are interested in partnering with us. This includes getting them to understand exactly what we do and where we fit in. For this, each presentation has to be tailored to whoever is listening, so I spend a lot of time tweaking presentations and rarely give the same one talk twice.

At the beginning I struggled a little bit because I’m so used to scientific talks, where I present all of the evidence I have collected and then show how I reached a conclusion after turning over every stone. In my current position, the small details are not always as relevant. In the beginning I was giving maybe too much information, as I worried I didn’t have enough data to back up my conclusions. Now, I have learned what’s actually important and focus my talks more narrowly.

What general advice do you have for someone thinking about transitioning into data science?

First, it is important to understand what makes you tick as a person to be sure that you’re following a career path with opportunities that will make you happy. Second, be patient. It is really hard to transition to a new career and a new environment. It doesn’t happen overnight, but the skills that you acquire during your PhD will be helpful. Staying determined and continuing to work at it are essential. Finally, create a support network of people who have the career you want as you are transitioning. I always reach out to people who have gone through the same path and understand their experience and the hurdles they have overcome. They can pass on knowledge that will make it easier for you or even provide resources that you wouldn’t have thought of.

About the author:

Melissa Drown is a PhD candidate at the University of Miami. She is a member of the Career Development Subcommittee.

In the Decoding Life series, we talk to geneticists with diverse career paths, tracing the many directions possible after research training. This series is brought to you by the GSA Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee. 

Stephen Klusza was inspired to become a scientist by his high school genetics teacher, whom he recalls was “ironically named Dr. Force.” In the middle of his graduate studies in biological sciences at Florida State University, he lost his ability to hear. Through determination, hard work, and supportive colleagues, Dr. Klusza continued his academic training and completed a postdoctoral appointment at the University of North Carolina. When he moved to Atlanta to serve as Adjunct Faculty at Atlanta Metropolitan State College, Dr. Klusza’s passion for helping students with diverse lived experiences grew even stronger. As an Assistant Professor of Biology at Clayton State University, Dr. Klusza continues to improve accessibility in his teaching and research for students with disabilities by combining his interests in expanding undergraduate research opportunities with universal design and open educational resources. He also leads the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Committee in the Genomics Education Partnership, aiming to provide bioinformatics research experiences to undergraduate students.

What inspired you to pursue a career in academia?

My inspiration goes back to my junior and senior years of high school. I was the salutatorian of my class and took almost every advanced placement class, of which biology was my favorite. I fell in love with genetics when I saw my teacher make the first Punnett square! I knew from that point on that I wanted to be a scientist. In the 1990s, being a scientist was more or less synonymous with academia. So, I wanted to be a geneticist and work at a university. Most people usually don’t get lucky in knowing what they want to do at such an early age, but my exposure to genetics in high school was pivotal in my career decision.

How was your graduate school experience as a PhD student with a disability?

My experience was overwhelmingly positive, as the department cared about its graduate students. I was diagnosed with profound hearing loss at the young age of 2. I still had some natural hearing and a hearing aid to supplement what I was missing, but it came to a point where I developed terrible tinnitus and lost the rest of my hearing during grad school, due to an undiagnosed birth defect in the inner ear. I had to go through a lot of medical appointments to figure out the cause. Through a specialist, I had the possibility of cochlear implantation to help restore hearing, which took about 2 years. The surgery was successful, and I actually heard more with the cochlear implant than I ever did with the hearing aid. 

During this period, my mentor, Dr. Wu-Min Deng, and my lab colleagues were highly supportive. Dr. Deng kept me in his lab and let me spend all the time I needed to shuttle back and forth between doing experiments and seeing specialists. I was also doing teaching assistantships, which was very hard, but the students were understanding. I’d walk around with a dry erase board so that they could write their questions on it and I could answer them. It took me around 7 years to earn my PhD, but I was fortunate to receive support from grad school.

Did your experiences influence your career choices?

I don’t believe that my disability influenced my personal decision to go into genetics. Part of the reason why it was easier for me to navigate the academic job market was my disability required a minimum of accommodations to fit in. I never relied too much on accommodations in the workspace, particularly when I got my cochlear implants, so it influenced my experiences but not my chances. 

When I was applying for jobs outside academia, there were times when I felt I was more than qualified for a position, but I didn’t get any response. In those situations, one can’t prove discrimination, but I had a gut feeling that they noticed my disability and threw my application out. I started thinking about which areas in science would be more welcoming to someone with a disability. I first worked as an Adjunct Faculty at Atlanta Metropolitan State College (AMC), where I really enjoyed teaching first-generation students. That changed my perspective on what I wanted to do in my life and started my current career trajectory. 

I’ve learned a lot more about the inequalities in the system while going up the academic ladder. Even with my disability, I had the privilege of being a white male. This is not to say that my hard work was immaterial to my success, but I most likely had some privileges that are inherent in the present system.

How did you get to your position at Clayton State University?

While working at AMC, I was looking at other jobs to continue my advocacy and take on a more prominent role in teaching and research. At that time, CSU needed a temporary lecturer for biology for one year, and thankfully, they accepted me for the position. This position allowed me to spend a year at CSU. I had a lot of opportunities to meet with faculty of the biology department and other departments and our Dean. I was blown away by how inclusive and incredibly diverse CSU life is! 

CSU has a much more visible presence for people with disabilities in jobs in administration, facilities, and management compared to other universities I have seen. It’s just a great place to be and to see how they guide students to better their lives. Luckily, there were Assistant Professor positions open. I applied for it and officially got the job in Fall 2020. As an Assistant Professor of Biology, I directly influence undergraduate students in research, and I love what I do!

How did you get involved with developing low-cost accessible educational resources?

College textbooks are expensive. For students who are unable to afford it, their ability to understand the material is reduced because they’re completely reliant on PowerPoint presentations. When I heard about “open educational resources,” such as writing a laboratory manual and books for free, I was amazed at how people spend a lot of time making no or low-cost resources that allow students to get involved in science. I’ve also seen labs devoted to creating low-cost lab equipment such as the Foldscope (Manu Prakash lab), which helps magnify images from a slide and costs only $10. 

Not only are there financial issues, but there are barriers to accessibility in teaching. Some students may have a disability that requires video or audio material to be presented differently. Sometimes a syllabus or other documents are written in very small fonts and can prevent some students from reading it. So, I started getting into the “universal design” approach, combining it with open educational resources. I’m still learning, but I want to spend time helping students who want to do science but can’t afford it.

Can you provide examples on how to improve accessibility in teaching and research?

If I have a syllabus, I can change the font to “OpenDyslexic” – an open-source font that is friendly for students with dyslexia. I then try to talk to dyslexic students, asking if it helped. I make sure to use colorblind-friendly images. I have an audio version of the text or a text-to-speech applet for printed materials. In my presentations, I add text descriptions to images to help people with visual screen readers. I turn on subtitles in the presenter view of the new versions of Microsoft with the accessibility feature. I also try to teach slowly. If I don’t make it to the end of the PowerPoint, I record a video to finish the rest.

I try to understand the difficulties students have due to the inaccessibility of the physical spaces in our labs. I want to help make that accessible as I get funds. What if a student has cerebral palsy? I would make it my highest priority to secure Opentrons lab robotics to pipette for them. I try to be proactive in embedding accommodations. In my lab, I want everyone to feel comfortable, supported, and valued. They need to know that they belong to science and I’m here to advocate for them. 

What suggestions do you have for scientific societies on building a diverse and inclusive work culture?

It’s not enough to have temporary measures in place to attract diversity. You’ve got to do the work to make the environment inclusive and supportive. We need to go deeper into the issues of why minorities or underrepresented groups face discrimination. This is continuing to be a problem and it’s disappointing. Things need to change. Let’s work together towards a solution and put our talk into action.

I want to pass on a message: if you ask people from underrepresented groups for DEI work and include their inputs, make sure you compensate them. Don’t expect them to do that for free. People that have undergone discrimination and faced barriers may have trauma from it. Being asked to do DEI work may re-traumatize them to the situation that they’ve lived in. 

Do you have any advice for early career scientists with disabilities?

It’s an uphill battle. Your journey won’t be without pitfalls and obstacles. It’s hard to get through the feeling that you may be alone in your fight, but you are not alone. My most important piece of advice is to be a part of the community of disabled scientists on #DisabilityTwitter and other platforms. Other grad students and faculty with disabilities will support you and let you know which places are more likely to support a disability. Making connections will help you persevere. 

Stephen Klusza at the onset of the pandemic and after one year working from home.

About the author:

Oindrila De is a member of the Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee and a PhD Candidate in the Department of Biology at Case Western Reserve University. She is passionate about making science inclusive and accessible to early career scientists with disabilities and leads the Accessibility and Disability Advocacy Group in the Early Career Leadership Program.

Guest post by Meredith M. Course* and Irini Topalidou.**

The career success of graduate students and postdocs (referred to here as “trainees”) is largely dependent on just one or two principal investigators (PIs). PIs influence how trainees think about science and whether they choose to stay in the field. The fundamental purpose of mentorship is for a trainee to intellectually and professionally benefit from the mentor’s experience and network. Good mentorship benefits PIs and institutions, too: well-mentored trainees will produce higher quality research, ultimately leading to labs that run smoothly and productively. Because PIs are largely responsible for defining our academic culture, who we put in these positions of power and what we expect of them deserve careful consideration.

Though a PI’s mentorship ability plays a crucial role in shaping the field, it is often undervalued and inadequate.¹ Not every PI possesses the understanding of what it means to be an effective mentor or knows how to apply these principles; some PIs have good intentions but simply don’t know how to train, guide, and support trainees; others do not prioritize good mentorship, and have no incentive to. Unfortunately, almost every academic institution— and many of their trainees— have suffered due to bad mentors. Given its significance, why is poor mentorship a persistent issue in academia? Major contributing factors include: (1) a lack of training for mentors, (2) the overwhelming demands of a faculty job, (3), a hiring and promotion method that ignores mentorship abilities, and (4) institutional protection of PIs at the expense of their trainees.

The issue develops well before a scientist becomes the head of a lab, since training to become a PI rarely includes learning to mentor effectively. During the doctoral and postdoctoral years, the chief goal of a future PI is to publish several quality, first-author papers—an expectation that does not require or promote mentorship abilities. This emphasis on research may result in outstanding experimentalists, but it does not create effective mentors.

After focusing on benchwork as a postdoc, a young PI experiences dramatic changes in responsibilities; they must suddenly excel as a mentor, manager, grant writer, and leader. Provided with little guidance, PIs are left to discover on their own, by trial and error, how to accomplish these tasks. Unfortunately, the “guinea pigs” of these trials are their trainees. Without being set up for success, overstressed PIs may end up misguiding or even mistreating their trainees.

Furthermore, because the main criterion for hiring and promoting a faculty member is the candidate’s quality of research and not their mentorship skills, institutions accumulate PIs who are not necessarily good at being mentors. In turn, this inadequacy can result not only in unsatisfied trainees, but also PIs who feel insecure or unhappy in their positions. The fact that the institutions entrusted with educating our future scientists do not require evidence of successful mentorship calls into question their role in properly training the next generation of scientists.

Because trainees depend on their PI’s guidance and support for professional success, they have difficulty finding where to turn to when a PI is either passively or actively failing to provide this support. Institutions often protect PIs because they provide grants, have tenure, or both. Institutional protection of PIs, coupled with the lack of a reporting system for trainees, can trap trainees in lab environments where they feel disempowered and alone.

The pervasiveness of poor mentorship in academia suggests that the issue is not a case of individual bad actors; rather, it is a systemic problem. Seen through this lens, we contend that mentorship reform should not fall solely to individual PIs, but to the institutions that both prepare and employ them. Institutions can begin to address this problem if they: (1) recognize the issue, (2) implement mentorship training for postdocs and PIs, and (3) use selection and evaluation methods that provide incentive and accountability.

First, the academy at all levels should recognize that capable mentorship is necessary for their trainees to have healthy and productive educational experiences, and for institutions to represent centers of educational excellence. Understanding that the responsibility of quality mentorship lies at multiple levels within the system—such as university leadership, department chairs, program directors, as well as PIs— is the first step toward improved mentorship.

Mentorship training should begin during the postdoctoral period. Postdocs interested in faculty positions should be encouraged to mentor trainees, and they should be offered mentorship training to improve their understanding of what it means to be a good mentor. This training and experience can help postdocs determine whether a position requiring mentorship truly fits their skills and interests. Alternatives to faculty positions should be considered and equally encouraged, especially for postdocs who are uninterested in mentorship.

Once hired, junior PIs should also receive mentorship training together with guidance and feedback from experienced PIs. It is crucial that this training be mandatory, as those who are unaware that they lack mentorship abilities are the least likely to seek it out. Mentorship training should be included in tenure requirements as part of the PI’s protected time, to signal to PIs that the institution prioritizes mentorship.

Equitable and inclusive strategies need to be part of mentorship training also, as trainees from underrepresented groups generally receive less mentoring than their well-represented peers, which prevents them from benefitting professionally in the same way.² Institutions should educate their PIs about this issue and outline how they expect them to combat it. Fortunately, high-quality, evidence-based mentorship trainings and tools are available freely (Entering Mentoring³ and The Science of Effective Mentorship in STEMM⁴ are excellent starting points), therefore institutions do not need extra resources to implement them.

Finally, institutions should realign their selection and retention criteria by requesting evidence of a candidate’s mentorship abilities for faculty hiring and systematically evaluating the PI’s ability to mentor at promotional junctures. After a PI is hired, feedback from both experienced PIs and trainees should be taken into account—and be taken seriously, which means that institutions need regular and standardized mentoring evaluations, such as the freely available Mentoring Competency Assessment.⁵ In addition, trainees who are struggling under poor mentors deserve human resources personnel to turn to when they need advice, advocacy, and protection from poor mentors. Requiring mentorship compacts^{6, 7} is another easy and free way for programs and departments to protect trainees, improve accountability for mentors, and assess mentors’ performances.

One of the chief responsibilities of a PI is mentoring future scientists, yet frustration over inadequate mentorship is frequently lamented among trainees. This is not just a failing of individuals, but signs of a system that sets up PIs to fail. Here, we’ve outlined several reasons why institutions accumulate poor mentors, and several steps they can take to ameliorate this issue. It is imperative that institutions take charge of the mentorship environment that they provide to trainees and implement selection, evaluation, and training paradigms that focus on the mentorship ability of those training our future scientists. The good news is that improved mentorship does not need to involve starting from scratch: quality, evidence-based, and free resources already exist. They deserve increased use and prioritization. Effective mentoring will not only improve the experiences of trainees, but also benefit individual PIs, institutions, and the scientific community as a whole.

*Division of Medical Genetics, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 98195, USA.

**Department of Biochemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, 98195, USA.

References 

¹A message for mentors from dissatisfied graduate students

C Woolston (2019)

Nature 575, 551-552

DOI: 10.1038/d41586-019-03535-y

²NIH Scientific Workforce Diversity Office

https://diversity.nih.gov/

³Entering Mentoring: A Seminar to Train a New Generation of Scientists

J Handelsman et al. (2005) https://www.hhmi.org/sites/default/files/Educational%20Materials/Lab%20Management/entering_mentoring.pdf

⁴The Science of Effective Mentorship in STEMM Online Guide

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

https://www.nap.edu/resource/25568/interactive/index.html

⁵The Mentoring Competency Assessment: Validation of a New Instrument to Evaluate Skills of Research Mentors

M Fleming (2013)

Acad. Med. 88(7), 1002-1008

DOI:10.1097/ACM.0b013e318295e298

⁶Mentorship Compacts/Contract Examples

UW Institute for Clinical and Translational Research

https://ictr.wisc.edu/mentoring/mentoring-compactscontracts-examples/

⁷Ten simple rules for developing a mentor–mentee expectations document

KS Masters and PK Kreeger (2017)

PLoS Comput. Biol. 13(9): e1005709.

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005709

Stuart Macdonald is the Director of the K-INBRE Bioinformatics Core Facility, as well as a Professor in the Department of Molecular Biosciences at the University of Kansas. He points out the importance of mentoring in his career journey, from the UK to the US, and he discusses how he balances different aspects of his job.

In the Decoding Life series, we talk to geneticists with diverse career paths, tracing the many directions possible after research training. This series is brought to you by the GSA Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee.

As a high school student, Stuart discovered his love of biology and knew that he would continue to study the subject in college. In high school, he was interested in animal behavior and ecology. Then, when he was an undergraduate at the University of Oxford, he became really excited by genetics and more quantitative and mechanistic aspects of biology. After his postdoc at the University of California, Irvine, he decided to pursue his career in the United States and joined the University of Kansas, where he currently serves as the director of the K-INBRE Bioinformatics Core alongside his faculty position. His enthusiasm for mentoring led to him becoming the director of Graduate Studies for the Department of Molecular Biosciences.

What is your role as the Director of the K-INBRE Core?

IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence (INBRE) is a type of NIH infrastructure grant for states that historically have received low levels of NIH funding. The vast majority of the funds that come through the organization ultimately go to supporting undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral research. All of the INBRE programs have a focus on bioinformatics. 

My role in the Kansas INBRE is to support training in informatics, both at the undergraduate and faculty level. For example, in the last few years, we’ve been able to do things with RNA sequencing that can really inform research, but you may have never thought about how you would deal with data like that or the infrastructure to carry out the analysis. We provide those kinds of things. We have lots of nodes in our cluster, and we have a mentor—a doctoral-level bioinformatics specialist—who works directly with faculty and students to help analyze the data or train them to analyze their own data. Also, we’ve started to do undergraduate training work.

Can you also talk a little bit about your role as a Director of Graduate Studies for the Department of Molecular Biosciences?

Being the Director of Graduate Studies actually involves a little less hands-on training than I might prefer. I mostly get involved quite heavily in the admissions process, to make sure that the graduate program runs relatively smoothly. I am also the point person for the students who are having difficulties with, really, anything. Especially when important decisions are about to be made, such as before the end of the last rotation, I get lots of people talking to me, asking for advice about which lab to pick. I can give independent advice on what they might really enjoy. It’s a fun job, but it is more of an administrative role than a mentoring role.

What are the most inspirational or challenging aspects of your work?

First of all, it always stays interesting. There’s always something new to be thinking about! The best thing is that I get to work with lots of different people with lots of different questions about their professional development and science.

However, working in different environments is also challenging because now I have a thousand balls in the air. It does help to be pretty organized, which I think I am. I  have also gained some experience over time. Fortunately, it takes me less time to review a paper than it did a few years ago. Since I’ve been Director of Graduate Studies for five years, I now understand enough about the institutional system that when I don’t know how to solve a student’s problem, I know exactly who to call. The worst thing is that once you know where your own limits are, you then have to say no to anything outside of that. However, that becomes very challenging to do because often those things you’re saying no to are things that you might either really enjoy or you think could be important. Briefly, it’s fun for the same reason it’s problematic.

You did your PhD in the UK but pursued your career in the US. Can you tell us about your transition process?

My experience was probably smoother than lots of people, since I speak English natively. In terms of a lab culture, the way research works is quite similar in the UK and the US. So, it was a pretty easy transition to make. I struggled with the same visa regimes that everybody does. Before I moved to the University of Kansas and eventually got a green card, I was on an H1B visa for a few years and a J1 before that. The problem is that the J1 visa only runs for a year, so you have to go back to your home country, spend several hours in the US Embassy and hope that you will get your passport soon. There was a time when I was due to fly back, and my passport arrived the morning of my flight. That was really scary. But those were really the only roadblocks. My transition was relatively straightforward—common language, similar culture to some degree. I think I had an easy ride, in all honesty. 

How has mentorship influenced your career, and what advice do you have for trainees on seeking out mentorship?

Mentoring has been really important for me over the years. My PhD was only three years in the UK. Hence, my experience level in comparison with a US person with a PhD was probably a little lower. But, my postdoc advisor was incredibly helpful from a practical and intellectual perspective. Toward the end, he started to really include me in the discussions about how grants get reviewed, how departments run, and how to think administratively about a faculty position.Those discussions were really helpful, particularly since I had no exposure to US granting agencies, because I couldn’t apply to anything as an international scientist. All that stuff was really valuable when it came to writing my first grant.

In terms of seeking out mentorship, firstly your PI is the person that you’ll go talk to for a lot of things. When you’re a graduate student, particularly in the US, the committee gives you this other set of people who are a little independent from your mentor. I think that’s a really valuable system because no one is going to have the perfect mentoring strategy. However, you should not just fill your committee with people who do the same sciences as you do; make sure there are people on that committee who you can actually talk to about things besides your specific science. There isn’t really a similar committee of people who work with you when you are a postdoc, so being comfortable seeking out mentoring is also important.

 Asking somebody for help is incredibly challenging because you don’t want them to see you as not being able to do your job, particularly in the first week after they’ve hired you. However, your colleagues want you to be successful because they have just hired you and they will want to help you out. Also everybody recognizes that when you start your faculty position or your postdoc, there’s lots of new stuff you’re going to have to do that you didn’t do in your previous job. When I first started my faculty position, I just found people who seemed to have incredibly functional labs and asked them about their secrets. I figured it would be really helpful if I got some advice, so that I could avoid making mistakes for the next year!

About the author:

Seyma Katrinli is a member of the Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee and a Postdoc at the Emory University School of Medicine.

Learn more about the GSA’s Early Career Scientist Leadership Program.

Join the Communication and Outreach Subcommittee of GSA’s Early Career Scientist Leadership and Professional Development Program.

Are you a student or postdoc with a passion for science communication and outreach? Gain valuable experience, professional skills, portfolio pieces, and a vibrant network by applying for the Communication and Outreach Subcommittee, one of four subcommittees under the GSA’s Early Career Scientist Leadership and Professional Development Program, brainchild of Sonia Hall.

“The opportunity to gain writing, communication, and storytelling skills as an Early Career Scientist is a huge opportunity. Whether your aim is academia, industry, or other, your ability to communicate science is of the utmost importance. Even if you do amazing science, if you can’t communicate it, the research won’t have much of an impact.”

— Aleeza Gerstein (Assistant Professor, University of Manitoba, former Co-Chair of the Communication and Outreach Subcommittee)

The goal of our subcommittee is to highlight discoveries that originate from the model organism community to demonstrate the roles genetics research plays in daily life. We invite all early career GSA members to apply to be part of our group. Keep reading to learn more about what it’s like to work on the subcommittee!

Building community while networking

Our committee places an emphasis on building community. Although we are spread across the world, we stay connected through monthly video conference meetings and online discussions on the team working platform Slack. We use these forums to support each other, share resources, advance projects, and celebrate individual and group accomplishments. Through these interactions, we’ve become better peer mentors and have gained a deeper understanding of the challenges faced by early career scientists.

“Being part of this subcommittee has opened up my network to a diverse and talented group of scientists who I now can call friends.”

— Alison Gerken (Research Molecular Biologist – USDA Agricultural Research Service, current member of the subcommittee)

“As I am interested in interdisciplinary problems, it is increasingly important for me to be able to reach peers with different ways of thinking, and this subcommittee is an outstanding platform to do so.”

—Angel Fernando Cisneros Caballero (Master’s student in Biochemistry, Laval University, current member of the subcommittee)

“This subcommittee has helped me expand my personal and professional network and further develop my leadership and organizational skills.”

—Jessica Velez (Graduate Research Assistant – University of Tennessee Knoxville, current co-Chair of the subcommittee)

Building a portfolio

Using Slack, video conference, and Google Docs, we work in small groups to write articles that are published in a variety of outlets. Our topics are varied, ranging from the practical applications of RNAi, the history of in situ hybridization, and the discovery of microtubules. Each member spends up to two years on the Subcommittee, so we’re able to develop a strong portfolio of work that allows us to stand out in a crowded job market—all while making meaningful contributions to the scientific community.

“The subcommittee has helped me practice throwing out the jargon and messy details and distilling complex ideas into something catchy and impactful.”

—Alison Gerken (Research Molecular Biologist – USDA Agricultural Research Service, current member of the subcommittee)

Developing diverse professional skills

Through our projects we develop strong writing and editing skills in addition to a variety of professional skills. Using a peer editing approach allows us to learn how to give and receive feedback. Our roles on the committee push us to refine our time management skills, manage projects effectively, implement teamwork strategies, and practice collaboration across space and time. These are important professional skills that take time and practice to develop. But perhaps most important, this experience allows us to develop ourselves as strong scientific professionals.

“I am not only developing my communication skills, but also expanding my professional network by working with a diverse group of early-career scientists, editing and reviewing each other’s work, and challenging myself by writing scientific pieces outside of my area of expertise.”

—Haifa Alhadyian (Graduate Research Assistant – University of Kansas, current member of the subcommittee)

“I’ve learned about various topics and contributed to pieces that are not within my area of expertise, and I’ve learned a lot from our senior members and advisors about the leadership skills that are needed to keep a team motivated.”

—Angel Fernando Cisneros Caballero (Master’s student in Biochemistry, Laval University, current member of the subcommittee)

Engage in novel opportunities

Beyond the unique experience that the projects afford, committee members are also empowered to become more involved at GSA conferences. From developing workshops, to hosting panel discussions, or participating in unique community events—there are lots of new opportunities!

“Jessica and I developed and led a workshop on establishing and expanding an outreach program. We summarized our outreach activities and presented ways others can break into their communities, in both local and web-based contexts. This was a new experience that helped me develop new skills I may not have had the opportunity to develop without being part of the subcommittee and Leadership Program.”

—Adam Ramsey (Graduate Teaching Assistant – University of Memphis, current Co-Chair of the subcommittee)

“I had the opportunity to pilot and host the first GENETICS Discussion event at a GSA Conference. We used this discussion to dive into the story behind the paper.”

—Jessica Velez (Graduate Research Assistant – University of Tennessee Knoxville, current Co-Chair of the subcommittee)

Join us!

We’re very excited to continue growing our subcommittee while publishing interesting articles for the general public and fellow scientists. We have some new project platforms and ideas in development, but we need your assistance! If you are interested in joining our subcommittee, please apply for the Early Career Scientist Leadership Program by November 30th, 2018. We welcome you as we continue to expand the subcommittee and communicate science!

“While I have a history of performing outreach and being an active proponent of science, I was a little apprehensive to be moving into a more visible role within the scientific community (a bit of imposter syndrome!). But the welcoming atmosphere of the subcommittee dashed that apprehension away. I realized I was selected for the subcommittee because I have talents to offer. It has been an enjoyable and rewarding experience playing a role in—and seeing first-hand—the accomplishments of the subcommittee.”

—Adam Ramsey (Graduate Teaching Assistant – University of Memphis, current Co-Chair of the subcommittee)

About the authors: The Early Career Scientist Communications and Outreach Subcommittee aims to draw connections between fundamental discoveries that have originated in the genetics community and show how they have contributed to advancements in science, medicine, and technology.

Turning vision into reality takes work—that much is obvious. But anyone who has written a proposal of any sort will realize that a coherent vision doesn’t appear out of thin air. It must be carefully crafted from an initial collection of goals, ideas, and ideals. This year, GSA’s staff, leadership, and membership are working hard together to reimagine the Society and hone a vision for the coming years. Following the productive brainstorming at our Blue Sky Meeting in May, the GSA Board of Directors met in June to begin turning the vision into reality.

An essential part of that strategic planning process is understanding the needs of our community. Our survey of nearly a thousand scientists and the Blue Sky participants taught us a lot about what you’re concerned about and how you think GSA can help. Despite the diversity of viewpoints and situations, there were three concerns shared by a large majority of participants, regardless of career stage: research funding, the current political landscape, and the public’s value of science. Among other insights, the survey also painted a picture of a pressure-cooker atmosphere among students and postdocs. This is perhaps reflected most starkly in the fact around a third are extremely concerned about their mental health.

Although this might all sound depressing, we know there are good reasons why people keep working despite these concerns. To get at some of the positives, we asked what excites you most about your work. Most of you—a diverse group—gave a small set of related reasons: you are most excited about learning, discovering, sharing, collaborating, improving lives, finding disease treatments, developing tools, conserving the environment, mentoring, and training.

As scientists, those experiences motivate us, too, and push us to find new ways to support our community. To gather some ideas, we asked what you thought were the most important ways a scientific society like GSA could serve you. The replies spanned a huge range, but in general they dovetailed closely with the ideas that emerged from our Blue Sky Meeting in May. The most common suggestions were:

• Advocate for science and scientists to policymakers;
• Help communicate and defend science to the public and policymakers;
• Promote basic research and the applications of genetics;
• Organize conferences and publish journals;
• Provide professional development, including for non-academic jobs; mentoring resources and job search help;
• Provide networking opportunities and creative ways for scientists to interact;
• Offer travel grants to attend conferences;
• Promote diversity and inclusion in our field.

To codify and prioritize these ideas in the context of a larger GSA vision, we dedicated most of the Board of Directors meeting in June to discussing the path forward. We are now forming working groups to help us create a strategic framework and gather more data to inform it. Although we won’t have the completed framework until the next Board meeting in December, there were a few highlights from our conversation that I think are worth sharing now:

1. GSA’s new Early Career Scientist programs, led by Director of Engagement and Development Sonia Hall, have been highly successful and fulfill a clear community need. These include the Early Career Scientist Leadership and Professional Development Program, the GENETICS Peer Review Training Program, New Faculty Forum, poster viewing invitation initiative, and more.
2. There is also interest in programs supporting members in mid- and late- career stages. There was particular concern about the funding difficulties of mid-career researchers, but also discussion of ways for retirees to remain engaged with the community.
3. Building on the hard work of our Early Career Scientist Diversity Subcommittee, we are forming a regular committee dedicated to researching and implementing meaningful diversity and inclusion initiatives.
4. We are revising our conference code of conduct and investigating best practice in this area.
5. We are forming a Conference Childcare Committee to ensure caregivers are supported at GSA Conferences.
6. We need to find new ways to empower our members to join in with our advocacy efforts, to engage effectively with the public and policymakers, and communicate the value of their research.
7. GSA needs funding to implement the new vision and ensure its programs remain financially viable.  We are therefore currently drafting plans to expand fundraising efforts within the society.
8. Last but not least, we believe that GSA should represent all of genetics and will thus be working to strengthen the representation not only of experimental organisms (the traditional “model organisms”) but also of agricultural species and species of ecological value.

Clearly, there’s a lot to do! I’m looking forward to the next half year to codify these principles and begin constructing the path to a sustainable GSA that will represent and advocate for all geneticists at all stages of their careers.

Guest post by Irini Topalidou.

In the last decade or so, biological research has moved to a new level of complexity and competitiveness. Principal Investigators (PIs) are now primarily tasked with grant writing and managing, while also executing the numerous additional responsibilities the position demands. But to be successful, labs require experienced scientists to help run them. There is a growing need for highly skilled, well-trained scientists who can run complex projects while also training and supervising students, evaluating data, writing manuscripts, contributing to grant writing, and managing the lab’s day-to-day operations.

Postdocs are rarely in a position to perform these tasks, given that their focus is on advancing their own projects in order to achieve proficiency and independence. Additionally, it usually takes several years to acquire the scientific maturity and experience of a skilled staff scientist. These circumstances mean we must reevaluate the traditional structure of labs that are composed exclusively of a PI and his or her trainees.

Some institutes are already applying new organizational methods by combining the expertise and interests of faculty members and experienced staff scientists (also known as research scientists).¹ This model allows staff scientists to lead ambitious projects while also working collaboratively with PIs, advancing complex projects that could not be accomplished otherwise. Often, faculty and staff scientists with different kinds of expertise partner, providing a diversity of experience that is beneficial to both the individuals and to science.¹ Combining the skills and interests of a PI with those of a highly qualified staff scientist can amplify a lab’s success rate and increase overall progress. This synergistic model allows for a higher level of creativity and achievement that may soon be necessary for even traditional academic labs to run efficiently and successfully.

Currently, there are not many institutes that offer staff scientist positions, and they’re even rarer in university settings. Creating more staff scientist positions will be an ongoing challenge because long-held traditions create cultural barriers to change, and limited funding reinforces the use of more affordable postdocs. To retain more well-trained scientists in research-intensive roles, junior scientists and PIs must advocate for the creation of these positions within their research institutions and universities. Imagine a new era when universities and institutes recognize the benefit of providing positions with greater job security and professional respect, moving away from the practice of exclusively hiring inexpensive and inexperienced trainees.

It is also important for up-and-coming scientists to realize that it’s possible to be ambitious and desire to do good science without running your own lab. Too often these things are seen as incontestably linked, which is not necessarily the case. Accomplished scientists who have decided not to pursue positions as PIs still make significant contributions to science.  Therefore, being a staff scientist should be recognized as a valid, satisfying, and rewarding career path in its own right. Faculty members and institutions, for their part, should realize that the position of staff scientist does not imply a lack of scientific drive or disinterest in professional advancement and should strive to promote and nurture more of these positions.This model will help keep talented scientists in research-intensive roles and serve to advance the goals of both individuals and institutions.

There exists a false narrative that the path to scientific success is always linear: from grad student to postdoc and then to PI. There should be alternative routes that create niches for experimentalists and the increasing numbers of devoted scientists who either do not want to open their own labs or are not able to obtain one of the rare tenure-track faculty positions.² This would not only benefit these individuals, it would also move science forward at a faster and more efficient pace.

1.Hyman, S. “Biology Needs More Staff Scientists.” Nature 16: 283-284 (2017).

2.Kuo, M. “Staff Scientists Find Satisfaction in Playing the Support Role.” Science (2017).

About the Author:

Irini Topalidou is a molecular biologist and geneticist who works as a Research Scientist in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Washington in Seattle. She is a strong advocate for basic research and the use of model organisms in biological research. In her research she uses C. elegans and mammalian cells to study dense core vesicle trafficking and Gq signaling in neurons.

Guest post by Bob Dolan.

An effective curriculum vitae (CV) is needed for  academic job applications, as well as for some research positions in other settings. This article will cover the important elements of writing a CV, along with strategies for navigating your academic job search.

Identify what you want

Before you begin, you should evaluate several factors:

• Do you need a job now? Do you have time to look now?
• Do you want a faculty position or another role within academia?
• Are you considering a postdoc or continuing education as an option? What are the financial implications of this option?
• Is the job market/economic climate likely to change in the next few years?
• Will your visa status impact your search?

Think about the academic institution you want to work in:

• Large vs. small
• Public vs. private
• Domestic vs. international

What features of an academic career interest you?

• What percentage of your time would you like to spend on research?
• What percentage of your time would you like to spend on teaching?
• What level of student would you like to teach and/or mentor?
• Are you looking for a position where your salary depends on grant funding, or something that has little need for funding?
• If you are considering a position in academic administration, what types of roles are available?

As with any job search, you should evaluate important lifestyle factors:

• Is the culture of the institution or lab aligned with your values and lifestyle?
• What type of setting are you comfortable working in?
• Will you be compatible with the work environment?
• Do your philosophies and life values align with the institution’s core values and guiding principles?

Use your network and know what’s out there

One of the most effective ways of finding faculty opportunities is through networking. For your academic job search to be successful, you have to develop connections in your department and in your field.  Faculty within your department can be important allies and mentors, but it is also helpful to connect with other faculty and postdocs on campus. They may be familiar with a wider range of potential employment opportunities. You should also see if your department offers information or notifications about specific position openings.

In addition to resources offered by your department or professional associations, you can find posted faculty positions for the universities in which you are interested on their website home page or human resources site. Other resources, both domestic and abroad, can be found in academic journals, society newsletters, and websites.

Sculpting your CV

Once you know the direction you are pursuing, you will need to create a document that aligns you with your targeted institutions. Your CV should provide a full list of your professional and educational history. Note that what is presented early on your CV will generally stand out more than material listed later.  

Highlight your strengths

Your CV should highlight the four to five key attributes you want the hiring committee to know about you. These include your skills (both technical and behavioral), achievements, your knowledge areas, and other professional qualities that you can bring to their department or lab.

Don’t forget about your behavioral assets, such as:

•       Ability to work in a collaborative environment
•       Ability to work in a multi-disciplinary lab
•       Ability to lead a lab project
•       Team orientation
•       Strong verbal and written communication skills

Length

For an early-career professional, a CV of two to four pages is not uncommon, while an individual with more experience could have a document of four to seven pages or longer.  

Sections

Heading
Include your name, address, and contact information.

Research
Your research should be clearly described on page one and include What you did, How you did it, and the Results/Impact of your effort. Researching the lab to which you are applying will enable you to show how you align with their environment. Generally, you should list your most current research first; but work that you have performed in the past may also align with the needs of the department. 

Teaching

If you are pursuing a faculty position that will be primarily a teaching role, consider placing your detailed teaching section before your research section. Include classes you taught, any teaching certificates, and mentoring that you performed. Include the size of your classes, whether you held office hours or corrected exams, and whether you have included student evaluations. If you are pursuing a faculty position where you will both set up a lab and teach, you must demonstrate both of those abilities in detail.

Follow the research and teaching sections with your other accomplishments, listed in their order of importance to your targeted audience.  

Publications

• List your publications in reverse chronological order, with the most recent first.
• Set your name off typographically, in bold or underlined font. This allows for easy identification of your position on the author list.
• Place an asterisk on papers for which you made a leading contribution.
• Group publications in sections, i.e. Books, Refereed Articles, Abstracts, etc.
• List “Work in Press”, “Submitted Articles”, or “Work in Progress”.

Your discipline may have a distinct protocol on how to list your publications. Check with your local career office for guidance.

Presentations

List the following:

• Title of paper
• Name of conference
• Dates and location
• You may also indicate “Invited Talk”, “Poster”, etc.

Fellowships

Be sure to include information about who provided the award and the relevant dates.

Honors and Awards

List these in reverse chronological order.

Dissertation

Add the title of your dissertation, including a brief description of your thesis work. You can also include this information in the research section, if you prefer.

Professional memberships

Certificates

Work experience

References

Depending on the employer, you will need three to five references. They should be individuals who can comment in a positive way about your technical abilities and how you fit with the institutions to which you are applying. If relevant, make sure at least one of your references can talk about your teaching abilities. Include their name and title, university affiliation/address, and contact information, such as their telephone number and email address. You should always ask permission in advance before including them on your CV. In very large labs, sometimes you may have to provide your references with a draft of your research to ensure that they deliver the right message.

In most academic application packages, your CV will be the lead document — so it’s important that you deliver a message that will capture the interest of readers and prompt them to invite you in for an interview. Good luck!

For additional resources on-line, consider:                            

https://chroniclevitae.com/job_search

https://careers.insidehighered.com/

www.jobs.ac.uk (includes a career resources section)

http://carnegieclassifications.iu.edu/

https://www.higheredjobs.com/default.cfm

http://nextwave.sciencemag.org/cdc/

http://www.academickeys.com

http://jobs.sciencecareers.org/jobs/europe/faculty/

https://www.aaas.org/

https://www.asm.org/   

About the author: 

Bob Dolan provides career counseling and professional development workshops for the Postdoctoral Scholars program at MIT. He is a Certified Job Search and Career Transition Consultant with experience in the field of Career Management since 2001. Before joining academia, Bob had a private Career Consulting practice and worked with clients across multiple industries, as well as providing career consulting services for a global Career Management firm.

Chris Mason, Associate Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, talks about revolutionizing academic research by setting a 500-year survival plan, harnessing the power of citizen scientists, crowdfunding, and creatively using genetics expertise across disciplines.

In the Decoding Life series, we talk to geneticists with diverse career paths, tracing the many directions possible after research training. This series is brought to you by the GSA Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee.

Chris Mason contributes to an interplanetary survival plan based on multi-level, integrated Next Generation Sequencing data to understand tumor evolution, genome regulation, DNA and RNA modifications, and genome/epigenome engineering. He is a metagenomicist; he uses genomics to study all the organisms of the environment, including New York City (PathMap, Meta-SUB) and NASA’s international space station, thus giving us insight into the beneficial and less scary side of microbes and how they might influence the next 500 years of human existence. His work extends beyond academic research as he is the founder of several companies including Genome Liberty and the Pillar Health, which are personalized genomics companies to democratize access to genetic information, as well as Biotia, which brings machine-learning to map DNA and pathogens as they emerge in hospitals to predict their next move and to prevent hospital-acquired infections (HAI).

Did you ever see yourself as a metagenomicist of the Earth and beyond?

Mason in the lab. Image Credit: Weill Cornell Medicine.

I learned in middle school about the awesome power of the information contained in a single cell. This innate information can lead to the genesis of all other cells, including a cell’s response to disease, and a wide range of traits about a person. It is a beautiful fact of life. My fascination with the genetic code led me to pursue a career as a human geneticist. As I learned more about microbiomes and other genomes around us, I started to imagine the world around us like Neo in the movie The Matrix where he could see the code embedded in the world. The visuals of The Matrix expanded my curiosity from human genetics alone to the whole interplay of all the genomes from cells, fragments of plant, bacterial, viral, animal, and human DNA and RNA molecules interacting constantly. Then I thought: what if we actually tried to understand all that using systems biology approaches? I have always been interested in space too, so I combined what I love about humanity, living in space, and long-term plans for humans using genomics—because it is the inevitable next step for our species as well as those around us!

Your work made me think of my germaphobe friends who take the subways often. Should we be concerned about microbes?

Generally, you don’t have to worry: the subway is safe. If you practice basic common sense, the odds are very good that you will never come across anything that will do harm. Data from projects like Meta-SUB consortium will lead to geo-spatially informed decisions on optimal routes, giving you the least susceptibility to disease or perhaps the most interactions with the microbes that you need in your immune system and current microbiome. Though our knowledge about the microbiome is still evolving, I envision that it won’t just be about avoiding microbes, but will also include customizing your routes to work and medicine to give you the best microbes you might need. This is likely 10-15 years away.

Your optimism for a successful futuristic society led to a five hundred year survival plan. Tell us how it came about.

We are the only species that is aware of our own extinction, and that gives us a right and a responsibility to protect ourselves, the things in us, and the things around us. It is helpful to plan this optimism through the lens of a long-term, or five hundred year plan. It seemed like a logical conclusion, to look at the universe and know that all of this human progress, scientific knowledge, art, music, poetry, and all human endeavors will go away unless we as a species preserve and protect it. The specifics of the five hundred year survival plan are divided into to ten phases, which start by completing the functional annotation of the human genome and identifying important genes that can or can’t be changed—what I call the “do not disturb list.” This sets the stage for identifying and introducing new gene variants and studying their effect on humans—a prerequisite for human engineering, testing survival in space, and the eventual settlement in new worlds. Surprisingly, things that sounded hard in that plan a few years ago now seem easy, especially with the advent of CRISPR technology.

Tell us about the people who helped you transform your curiosity into a career.

My mentorship started during my undergraduate years after I read an article in the student newspaper. I emailed professor Max Lagally asking if I could do a summer internship on using DNA to do high scale computation. Both Max and Lloyd Smith became my mentors despite being in different departments than mine. I learned from them that if you tell a student that you believe that he or she is smart and capable of discovering great things, that person suddenly feels that they can do great things, even if they didn’t before — or at least I did. The simple belief that they can discover great things will help them accomplish their goals. I try to take a similar approach with my own students.

Your work involves a lot of international collaborations. How can early career scientists participate in projects with contributors located around the globe?

Mason in the lab. Image Credit: Weill Cornell Medicine.

My advice would be to just start something! You would be amazed by how many people will help you, and how easy it is today to get connected with social media. Graduate students and postdocs can engage with each other using online communities like Snapchat, Twitter, and blogs, and work with each other online to establish international consortia while also using crowdfunding to support their research. Another possibility are citizen scientists that facilitate international and multidisciplinary projects that are literally impossible to do as one lab or university or country. They necessitate the interaction and coordination of hundreds or thousands of people, in some cases. Citizen scientists enable new science, engaging people and crossing disciplines, boundaries, and cultures. You have to also learn to be humble and collaborative. You need to swallow your pride and understand that this is all of us working together on a global project.

Are there any specific experiences you’ve had as a professional that have shaped your career?

I was an expert witness during the Myriad case against gene patenting during my postdoctoral fellowship, and it had a big impact on my career. What are the genetics rights that you have? Can you modify or “discover” your DNA? I wrote several declarations for the case, which were cited by the courts and even helped us win won 9 to 0 in the U.S. Supreme Court. The biggest lesson from that case was that if you really believe in something and you work hard, you might actually be right and can win in the end, even if it takes six to seven years with everyone saying that you are wrong.

This work inspired the establishment of Genome Liberty and Pillar, which are direct-to-consumer genetics and genomics companies that offers genomics services for improved health. Our goal is to raise awareness about genetic rights by helping patients learn more about their conditions and improve their health care by means of a participatory medicine paradigm.

What are some of the extracurricular activities that you enjoy?

I enjoy running, music, and I love to write. I am actually working on a book of genetics poetry, which will come out later this year. Spending time with my family is another one of my favorite things; the biggest problem I have is that I love both my family and my work, but my daughter is too young to help in the lab… at least for now.

 About the author:

Faten Taki is the Liasion for the Early Career Scientist Career Development Subcommittee and a postdoctoral associate at Weill Cornell Medical College. Her goal is to be able to give back to the scientific community while still growing as an early career scientist.

Learn more about the GSA’s Early Career Scientist Leadership Program.