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BIOPHYSICAL SOCIETY NEWSLETTER
10
OCTOBER
2016
Molly Cule
What skills are needed to do
research and manage a lab?
Building and managing a lab typically involves re-
cruiting and building a strong
team of researchers, obtaining
funding (and balancing bud-
gets once you do!), guiding
multiple research projects,
marketing group success, and
disseminating results through
publications and presenta-
tions. You will be managing
many administrative details,
including regulatory compli-
ance, lab safety, as well as intellectual property and
data management. Experimentalists will be pur-
chasing and maintaining equipment and invento-
ries. Of course, deep technical and analytical skills
remain very important to advancing your research,
but typically you won't be performing a majority
of the hands-on work, so communication skills
and an ability to understand and motivate your
staff are also extremely important. Much of your
time will be spent writing, whether it be grant
applications, project reports, editorial reviews, or
original manuscripts, so an ability to write quickly
and clearly is essential. Rarely will you have long,
uninterrupted periods to work alone, so an ability
to work efficiently in short bursts is key.
Although graduate students should prioritize
building technical skills and a strong research
portfolio, there are often opportunities to develop
management skills even during your early training.
Hopefully you are meeting regularly with your
faculty advisor to discuss your progress. Make
sure that you address professional skill develop-
ment in addition to technical training in your
annual review. There are often opportunities to
lead small projects within your group — oversee-
ing compliance with lab safety rules or maintain-
ing a critical piece of equipment, for example.
Volunteering to help organize a workshop on your
campus will provide management and organiza-
tional skills, and will allow you to expand your
professional network. Many universities offer pro-
fessional development seminars and the Biophysi-
cal Society offers training both online and at the
Annual Meeting through its Career Development
Center.
Student Center
Jasmine Nirody
Center for Computational
Biology
University of California,
Berkeley
Q:
What made you decide to study
biophysics?
Ever since I was really young, I've been interested
in how things move. In college, my research
focused on animal locomotion (specifically, on
snakes, which are far less scary and way cooler
than everyone thinks!). My research interests have
fluctuated widely since then, but generally tend
to equilibrate around some form of biomechan-
ics. Currently, I'm interested in how molecular
motors convert chemical energy into mechanical
work. It's completely fascinating how drastically
mechanics differs across scales: Very small things,
which primarily deal with viscous rather than
inertial forces, have to use totally different loco-
motive strategies than the creatures we observe in
our daily lives.
Jasmine Nirody