Justyna Fert-Bober, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, USA
Adelaide, Australia (September 15, 2019) — The HUPO World Congress is proud to announce the Fifth Annual International Mentoring Day on September 15, 2019.
If asked to name a mentor that has helped to shape you, would you be able to identify one? What are your expectations of such a mentor? What characteristics define a remarkable mentor? As a mentee what can you offer to your mentor? These questions and more, will be discussing during the HUPO Mentoring day.
The focus of the annual Mentoring Day being held during the HUPO World Congress 2019 is on mentor-mentee relationship and how to establish productive networks needed for early career scientists. This year, the program covers the following topics:
1. Mental and Health Wellness - Yours and the people around you.
2. The art of self-promotion and lab-promotion.
3. Bad manuscript review, bad grant review. - How to respond to them!
4. Selling proteomics and bioinformatics to scientists outside the field
During this workshop, mentees will meet and interact with a stellar group of mentors that have established themselves as international leaders in proteomics, including (in alphabetic order): Dr. Stuart Cordwell (Australia), Dr. Daniel Figeys (Canada); Dr. Martin Larsen (Denmark), Dr. Merry Lindsey (USA), Dr. Birgit Schilling (USA) and Dr. Jennifer Van Eyk (Canada/USA).
Each mentor is coming from different cultural and sociological background. They all took different pathways to become PIs, but they all have one thing in common, they are all passionate about sharing their experience with early career scientists. This workshop promotes face-to-face discussions, friendly roundtable exercises and lots of career advice. Self-promotion is a very subtle art. It requires building relationships, and this workshop is an excellent opportunity to start creating new ones.
Please see below our mentors’ biographies:
Stuart Cordwell is a professor of Analytical Chemistry at the University of Sydney, who has co-supervised 16 PhD students and more than 20 Honours students. Stuart obtained his PhD at the University of Sydney. He was an author on the manuscript that defined the term ‘proteome’ in 1995 and has been involved in proteomics research throughout his career. He also established the first laboratory-based undergraduate Proteomics course in Australia. Dr. Cordwell’s vision for the Australasian Proteomics Society is to provide an inclusive society and support network that encourages the participation of Early and Mid-Career Researchers, as well as providing financial and travel support for students and consistent high-quality meetings of international standard.
Quote: ‘Get angry, get emotional, channel the energy into your reply; then sleep on it, consider it, remove the emotion and your argument will be strong’
Daniel Figeys is professor in the Department of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Ottawa. He is the founding director of the Ottawa Institute of Systems Biology and is the co-founding director of the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica-University of Ottawa Joint Center in Systems and Personalized Pharmacology. Dr Figeys obtained his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Alberta and did his postdoctoral studies at the University of Washington in Molecular Biotechnology. Daniel was previously Senior Vice-President at MDS-Proteomics and more recently co-founded MedBiome and Biotagenics, two early start-up biotech companies. His laboratory has published over 180 papers and has been cited over 14,000 times. Through starting new companies and transferring technology to industry Daniel has experience in “Selling the power of proteomics and bioinformatics to scientists outside the field”. He is also responsible for a professional skill development program that amongst other skills includes wellness, networking and self-promotion.
Quote “I wish these types of training had been available when I was a student/postdoc instead of having to learn on the fly”
Merry Lindsey is Chair of the Department of Cellular and Integrative Physiology and Founding Director of the Nebraska Center for Heart and Vascular Research (NE-CHVR). Her research is focused on using proteomics to understand extracellular matrix responses to cardiac injury. Specifically, her lab develops multidimensional approaches to examine the mechanisms whereby the left ventricle responds to injury with the goal to develop therapeutic strategies to prevent, slow, or reverse the progression to heart failure. She is also dedicated to disseminating scientific results to the general, scientific, and medical communities and educating the next generation of scientists. Dr. Lindsey serves as Deputy Editor for the American Journal of Physiology- Heart and Circulatory Physiology and is on the editorial boards for Circulation Research and Basic Research in Cardiology. She is actively involved in the American Physiological Society, the American Heart Association, and the American Society of Matrix Biology and has presented her research at over 150 national and international venues. Her trainees routinely publish high impact articles, win research awards for excellence, and successfully transition to independent faculty positions.
Quote: The trick to answering reviewer comments is to make sure future reviewers can never make the same comment
Rob Rivers is a Program Director at the United States National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases which is a part of the National Institutes of Health. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Chemistry from the University of Cambridge and a B.S. degree in Chemistry from Kentucky State University. In his current role he funds graduate students and post-doctoral fellows, as well as managing programs designed to foster the recruitment and training of minority and underrepresented biomedical investigators. Dr. Rivers trained early graduate students and early stage investigators on the importance of clear communication for promotion of science as well as ensuring wellness both physically and mentally.
Previously he worked at as Program Official at the Office of Cancer Clinical Proteomics Research with a focus on funding proteogenomic research on colon and ovarian cancers. He is active in the local and global community and was instrumental in starting the international non-profit organization Umbrella Initiatives Foundation that helps in providing improved educational opportunities to children living in poverty in Peru, Bolivia and the United States (www.umbrellainitiatives.org).
Importance of Wellness:
“Physical and mental wellness is integral in sustaining research pursuits over one’s career. When we don’t look after ourselves, then the quality of our work will decline as well.”-Rob Rivers
Quote If you don’t have time for wellness, then sooner or later you will be making time for illness.
-Adapted from Edward Stanley
Brigit Schilling is an Assistant Professor and the Director of the Mass Spectrometry Core at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging in California, with an Adjunct Professor appointment at the University of Southern California (USC). The Schilling lab develops and implements innovative protein analytical technologies to advance basic biology and biomedical research related to aging research. Research projects include investigation of protein phosphorylation, acetylation, and other posttranslational modifications, as well as differential expression of proteins during disease and aging processes. The Schilling lab has been highly successful in adopting novel proteomic technologies to achieve comprehensive and sensitive quantification capabilities. Dr. Schilling has mentored several postdoctoral fellows and research associates and provided strong support for them to achieve their career goals and offer them opportunities, such as attending conferences and educational courses.
Quote: Sharing scientific ideas with others and being able to discuss and present posters or talks at conferences is a big step towards building your own scientific network and establishing contacts that can be fostered throughout your career.
John R. Yates is an American chemist and professor of chemical biology at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California. His work is focused on developing tools and in proteomics and he specializes in mass spectrometry. Dr. Yates III is the recipient of the 2019 ASMS John B. Fenn Award for a Distinguished Contribution in Mass Spectrometry, for development of automated, large-scale interpretation of peptide tandem mass spectral data. Dr. Yates’ SEQUEST algorithm laid a critical foundation for the field of proteomics and has enhanced the accuracy and effectiveness of mass spectrometry to understand important biological and clinical questions. He also received the Thomson Medal in 2018. He has trained MSc/PhD students, post-doctoral fellows and PhD students. His strengths in leadership and mentoring help many to transited into independent faculty positions
Quote: Every 4-5 years you have to throw yourself onto the job market to see what you’re worth.
Jennifer (Jenny) Van Eyk is a Professor of Medicine at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Director of the Basic Science Research in the Barbra Streisand Woman’s Hearth Center and Director of the new Advance Clinical Biosystems Institute that has the motto “from discovery to patient care”. She co-director of the Cedars Sinai Precision Health, focused on in-hospital and population individualization of health care. Dr. Van Eyk is an international leader in the area of clinical proteomics and her lab focuses on developing analyical pipelines for de novo discovery and large-scale quantitative mass spectrometry methods. The aim is to maximize throughput and reproducibility to move targeted and robust discovery methods into continuous large population assessment and to develop clinical grade assays for neurological and cardiovascular diseases. To this extent she, oversees the new Cedars-Sinai Precision Biomarker Laboratories which consists of the Translational and CAP/CLIA certified clinical lab.
Dr. Van Eyk was a technician prior to obtaining her PhD from the University of Alberta (Canada) and doing her postdoctoral research in Heidelberg and University of Illinois in Chicago. Her first faculty position was at Queen’s University in Kingston Canada where she started her first company. She was recruited to Johns Hopkins University and then to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. She has mentored over 30 graduate students and post-doctoral fellows who are now successful in many different science-related jobs.
Quote: Fill your life and lab with wonderful amazing people and create an environment where they can become the best they can be.
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