Blacksburg, Va.-- Today's college graduate with a degree in chemistry, chemical engineering, or biology, will not find many jobs in academe, where turnover is not brisk. Graduates are more likely to be offered a job by a large pharmaceutical company or a biotechnology start-up company. Or they may even start their own company.
In any case, they will have the best chance of success if their degree cuts across classical department boundaries-- and not only the disciplines of chemistry and biology. An exposure to business and public speaking, and good writing skills, will also do them a lot of good, says Tracy Wilkins, director of biotechnology at Virginia Tech. "The highest paying jobs in biotechnology and chemistry are not behind the bench with test tubes, but are out front: in management, information technology and marketing." In biotechnology companies, most of these people have degrees in a scientific discipline.
Wilkins will be speaking about jobs of the future at the Young Chemists session of the 218th American Chemical Society National Meeting in New Orleans, Aug. 22-26.
When biotechnology began, the molecules of interest were proteins, like insulin. These human proteins were "engineered" and produced by bacteria in large vats, but they had to be injected instead of given orally as pills, explains Wilkins. In big pharmaceutical companies, chemists are primarily involved in the production of small therapeutic molecules that can be given as pills. These drugs interact with protein receptors like a key in a lock to cause the desired effect. Now large pharmaceutical companies have adopted biotechnology tools to identify and recreate target receptors. Chemists now use robotic synthesis techniques to produce thousands of different variations of compounds and to find the best small molecule to interact with the receptors. "To create small molecule compounds-- in other words, drugs that can be administered as pills-- the pharmaceutical industry is integrating the skills of the organic chemist and chemical engineer with those of the gene jockey and cell biologist" says Wilkins. "It is a great help for the new chemist if she can understand the different languages."
"Jobs in regulatory affairs, coordination of clinical trials, and bioinformatics are lucrative alternative careers for science graduates. But, university professors do a poor job of even informing students about these careers, let alone training them," says Wilkins. "Students need to take the initiative to expand their course load and vary their skills."
Even if they do end up as university researchers, people with biotechnology skills often find themselves involved in a business of their own, says Wilkins, who is co-owner and president of TechLab, Inc., a firm that develops diagnostic tests and vaccines for human diseases. Wilkins also started TransPharm, Inc., which merged with PPL Therapeutics, the company that was involved in cloning Dolly and now produces human therapeutic enzymes in the milk of farm animals. Virginia Tech faculty members have also established companies to produce human proteins in transgenic plants, produce vaccines, kill cockroaches, protect crops from fungi, and produce specialty chemicals.
Wilkins' talk, "Professors as Biotech Entrepreneurs and Alternative Careers in Biotech," (YCC 3) will be at 2:25 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 24, in Marriott La Galerie 1. The talk is part of the "Biotech & society in the new millennium" symposia co-sponsored by the Younger Chemists Committee of ACS and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Contact for more information: Tracy Wilkins, 540-231-6935 or tracyw@vt.edu . He will not be in his office August 21-26.