Vanderbilt Beyond The Lab Podcast

Dr. Amicia Elliott always knew she wanted to be an entrepreneur. But on the path, she collected tools for her entrepreneur toolkit to get her to where she is today: PhD training, tech transfer, government research, postdoc fellowship. Now she is the Product Director with Form Bio. Hear about all the steps in her path on the last episode of Season 7. 

Dr. Justine Sinnaeve, PhD, is an Associate Scientific Director at Ashfield MedComms and tells us about her experience graduating during COVID and how she utilized that time to work freelance before launching into her SciComm/Medical Writing role. 

After a successful internship with Health Research in Action, Lindsay Redman Rivera used her experience to pivot to a full-time position. She discusses what she learned during her PhD training as well as shares her approach to the two-body-opportunity.

After a fellowship with the FDA in regulatory, Dr. Todd Townsend, PhD, shares his path to his current role as the Regional Medical Scientific Director, Cardiovascular & Metabolism at Merck. 

A love of food, creative scientist Jake Brown, PhD, found a way to combine his educational background with his long-term interests, now serving as a Product Development Scientist with Mars Petcare. 

Is management consulting right for you? Dr. Courtney Copeland, PhD, tells her story about the pivot from biomedical science PhD to a management consultant!

Dr. Jeff Bylund, PhD, knew he enjoyed talking about science but he didn't want to continue at the bench. Join us for a laugh and a good career exploration discussion about Dr. Bylund's career ventures after his time training at Vanderbilt.

Going the "industry" route doesn't always mean Big Pharma! Learn from alumna Léolène Carrington, PhD, what it is like to work for a smaller company and how your love of science and learning can dictate your career.   

Dr. Bojana Jovanovic is quite familiar with the Beyond the Lab series. She stepped in for the intro and logo at the launch of this series! Now, she is the Senior Scientific Lead, Clinical Biomarker Development at Eli Lilly|Loxo Oncology. We catch up about her path and current role, as well as how important the Molecular Medicine program was to her time at Vanderbilt. 

There is no typical day for co-founder and CEO of Infinimmune Wyatt McDonnell, PhD. Dive in to the whatnots and to-dos of starting and maintaining a company in this episode. 

The jump from academia to a start-up has been a fun one and we learn more as we sit down with Dr. Martin Moore, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer of Meissa Vaccines. 

After some nudging from the ASPIRE Program, Dr. Chris Smith, PhD, started looking at academic roles in Postdoc Affairs and found his vocation! But his work as a postdoc himself was pointing to this all along! Join us as Dr. Smith tells us more about his role in academic administration and serving the postdoc population on the other side of the desk.

What came first for Kristi Thiel: Co-Founder or Professor? Learn more about Dr. Thiel's interesting steps in her career path and all the great ideas that have helped her along the way. 

We are excited to kick off Season 7 of the Vanderbilt University Beyond the Lab podcast with Merck Scientist Dave Westover, PhD. Dr. Westover tells us about his role, how he jumped into industry and what he would recommend current graduate students and postdoctoral fellows to pursue to make the move to industry. 

In this last episode of Season 6, Dr. Kristin Driscoll tells about her path since graduation and her current role in Competitive Intelligence for Cigna. 

Dr. Cara Lang, PhD, is a Disease Area Analyst of Ovarian Cancer with Oncology Resource Group. In this episode, Dr. Lang shares her insight into her role and how she made the decisions around her post-grad next step, as well as the opportunities that best prepared her for this position.

For our 100th episode, Dr. Keenan Taylor, PhD, tells us about his role in Big Pharma as a Senior Scientist. Dr. Taylor tells us about the differences he has seen between academia and industry and what his daily work life entails. 

Long title = lots of responsibility! Dr. Katherine Hutchinson, PhD, tells us about her role as a Senior Principal Scientist in Oncology Biomarker Development at Genentech, in San Francisco, California. Dr. Hutchinson tells us about her work in industry and life in San Francisco, while unpacking her long title!

Dr. Allison Eberly, PhD, describes her Clinical Microbiology Fellowship at the Mayo Clinic as well as her current role as an Assistant Professor at Washington University School of Medicine and the Assistant Medical Director at Barnes Jewish Hospital.

Dr. Melissa Maginnis, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Microbiology at the University of Maine and spends this episode talking about her path after Vanderbilt, the dual career search with her spouse, and the role as teacher and mentor in a University setting.