by SUA » Mon Jan 30, 2017 12:43 pm
I have 6 years of postdoctoral experience with expertise in lung and kidney diseases at two different Ivy league universities in United States. I did my PhD studying signal transduction of a protein that has functional role in breast cancer and lung fibrosis from a well renowned university in United Kingdom. Although in a small lab, during my first postdoctoral tenure, I gained expertise in lung diseases including acute lung injury and lung fibrosis. Being exposed to Ivy league university, I gained expertise in all molecular biology techniques including global proteomic profiling using mass spectrometry. After completion of 3 years I moved to a metro area in a big lab where my current PI is dean of an Ivy league university. Although the reason for the move is due to a family reason, this step made me to remain as a postdoctoral associate for 6 long years. However, during my second postdoctoral tenure, I gained expertise in kidney diseases including acute kidney injury and kidney fibrosis. In current university, I gained expertise in CRIPSR/Cas9 technique (functional genomics) and proteomic and phosphoproteomic profiling experiments using mass spectrometry. Also, I started an online specialization course and am trying to get a certificate (in 6 months or so) in “genomic data science” which includes expertise in programming skills for analyzing next generation sequencing data. So far, I have 4 first-authored original research articles, 7 first-authored review articles and 5 co-authored publications in decent journals. Furthermore, my petition for I-140 was approved under EB-1A category and I hope to get employment authorization document (EAD) in 3 months and permanent residency in 6 months or so.
In my current university, after about 6 months from the date of joining, I asked my PI to allow me to apply for my career development grants. He asked me to publish the two projects I started first and then apply for grants. So, I have written two manuscripts, out of which one manuscript is planned to submit to a high impact journal. Once this submitted, I plan to submit a second manuscript in a month or so. After this, I plan to write a grant outline with specific aims and ask my PI whether it is time to apply or not. The reason is I don’t know what does he mean by publishing two manuscripts since getting papers published can take up to several years. I am going to ask this after I have submitted both my manuscripts and to check whether I am on track to become tenure track professor.
Equally, I am aspiring to become a principal scientist in a biopharma/biotech industry transitioning from academic background. However, I am very new to industry environment and seeking some advice here. Given my expertise in genomics and proteomics in pulmonary and cardio-renal diseases and 6 first authored original research publications and mentoring experience what are my chances to get an investigator/supervisor/principal scientist position in biopharma/biotech industry? What are the other criteria that I should meet, for example obtaining any grant money from organizations, networking with hiring/lab managers etc? How can I meet these managers (what conferences etc to network) who hire principal scientists? How long does it take to get an official confirmation from the interview for the above position? Is it a good idea to get principal scientist position in a smallish company in any biotech hub and move to a top R&D biopharma/biotech industry?
Any suggestions or advice is highly appreciated.
Thank you very much.