Becker’s Hospital Review | Immunology and Innovation
By | I have always loved science. As a kid, I collected bugs. As a college student, I shadowed doctors and studied autoimmune disease in the lab.
My difficulty in separating emotion from the practical side of medicine eventually compelled me to pivot away from the bedside to the bench and pursue a Ph.D. in immunology. The interdisciplinary nature of immunology had always intrigued me. The immune system plays a key role in human health, including cancer, wound healing, respiratory, gut health, or allergies. It’s connectivity to so many disciplines facilitates translation of discovery to the bedside.
While training as a post-doctoral fellow at The Scripps Research Institute, I was intrigued by the process of taking academic discovery to market. I was fortunate to secure hands-on exposure through an internship in the office responsible for commercializing Scripps’ discovery. Soon thereafter, I made the permanent jump from the bench to a position at City of Hope National Medical Center, in the Office of Technology Licensing. My colleagues and I were responsible for commercializing therapeutic, diagnostic, medical device and health care IT technologies developed by City of Hope’s clinicians and researchers from concept to market. More…
