N.C. Biotech Center launches fellowship program for university researchers

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. - The North Carolina Biotechnology Center is launching a program that could foster more commercialization of research work being done at the state’s universities.

This time, however, the focus is minds, not matter.

Called the NCBC Industrial Fellowship Program, it is designed to help scientists in postdoctoral work “transition” to private-sector jobs in the state’s life science industry. Across North Carolina, more than 50,000 people work in biotech-related companies.

The program will cost the Center about $500,000 a year, a spokesperson said.

Accelerating commercialization of discoveries and advances made in university research labs continues to be the focus of efforts at the institutions as well as government agencies and private sector investors such as venture capital firms.

“This is economic development one person at a time,” said Rob Lindberg, who leads business acceleration and what the Biotech Center calls “out-licensing” efforts. “We don’t want to lose that talent pool.”

Now, the Biotech Center is rolling out the fellowship program in an attempt to help the state retain scientists and also help private-sector firms find needed researchers.

“We know of nowhere else in the world where there is a defined pathway for life scientists seeking to transition from academia to industry,” Lindberg said. “This is not an internship,” he added.

The Biotech Center will award five “Industrial Fellowships” per year, and each will receive two years in salary and benefits. The fellows will be placed at N.C.-based biotech companies that are focused on discovery or contract research. Each company must also agree to provide a senior scientist for mentoring.

In addition to research work, the fellows are to receive access to other areas of training such as in regulatory affairs or intellectual property.

Shobha Parthasarathi, the technology development director at the Biotech Center, will oversee the fellowship program.

Companies will be screened by the Biotech Center to determine which will receive a fellow. The companies will screen applications for the fellow program through the Biotech Center.

According to the Biotech Center, some 3,000 postdoctoral fellows work at N.C. universities and are competing for faculty positions. However, no more than 50 percent ultimately crack tenure-track positions, and most of those who do win those spots do so at institutions where they have received postdoctoral training.

N.C. universities graduated 280 PhDs in life sciences in 2006.

“Not surprisingly, many freshly minted PhD scientists and postdoctoral fellows are considering futures in industry,” Lindberg said. “But unlike degree programs in fields such as engineering, law or business, graduate and post-graduate scientific training programs do not typically provide exposure to the world outside of academia as a formal component of the training.”

The Biotech Center is accepting applications for fellows as well as companies that want to participate.