Hi all. I'm learning about antibodies production using CHO cultured in bioreactors. I have been researching online on the method to collect the cells and collect the antibodies. I just don't fully understand everything and hoping someone can clarify it for me. Once the CHO cells are ready to be harvested, the retention method can be using a filter. Does the cells flow back to the bioreactor tank? Then it will go through a different connection line to purify the antibodies?

I have learned a little bit about chromatography to purify protein in college. For those big reactors 50L and larger, the volune of cells to be purified must be large. Are there big chromatography that connects straight to the bioreactor?

Here's my vent - not expecting much, but just need to get it off my chest. I truly believed I was a shoo-in for this role at a big pharma, aiming for a senior scientist position. Went through the whole nine yards: five interview rounds, including a panel and finally with the executive director. Oddly enough, that final interview was less of an interview and more of a compliment session on my qualifications and the positive buzz from the team about me. The entire 20-minute talk felt like it was wrapping up after just asking a couple of questions, one of which I knew would catch his interest given it aligned with the cutting-edge technology he was integrating into their work. I sent a thank-you note post-interview. But after a week of silence, I got nothing but a cookie-cutter rejection via email after nudging the recruiter. Tried reaching out to the hiring manager for feedback, but got ghosted.

Honestly, I was transparent about my salary expectations, indicating I had some wiggle room, hoping for at least a negotiation. This rejection has been a hard hit to take. While I understand that hiring decisions are complex, I can't help but feel that after reaching this stage, a more personalized response or some feedback would have been appropriate. Especially in our industry, where paths often cross, ensuring a positive experience, even in rejection, could have made a significant difference. So, dear hiring managers, remember: a little feedback and a touch of personalization can greatly impact how candidates view your company and potentially interact with it in the future.

It’s a one year program, brand new, at a good school, just don’t know if it will be helpful for my career in the long run, I just want to work in industry

I recollect that few weeks ago someone in biotech industry posted here, volunteering to answer questions from people, who seek to move from academia to the industry. It seems that the post was highly popular, but the OP got overwhelmed and stopped answering (there are > 300 comments under the post).

I have a question long these lines. Has anyone here personally worked with or can recommend a mentor / career coach?

As far as I can research, what is available are either borderline frauds (like well-known “association”, who’s name I won’t mention here) or grifters/clueless people. I have seen some people, who either work in university administration (all these useless offices of graduate studies, offices of postdoctoral affairs etc.) or sell some BS “career training” courses to universities, which then are paid for by similarly clueless admin. Despite being useless, they call themselves “career coaches”.

In my opinion, if a person has not worked in the field, if a person has not been hiring people yourself, if a person has not interviewed people – I’m sorry, but why should anyone listen to such "career coach"?

I would like to find someone, who either has worked in the industry for a long time, or made a successful career switch out of life sciences into something more meaningful.

Roughly a decade ago I finished my Ph.D. in life sciences. I have done 3 years of postdoc in a shithole university in Canada, after which I had to run for my life and took the first job I could secure. Back in the day, I thought that getting in life sciences was a smart choice, because I thought I will acquire skills will be valued in biotech industry (I was never dead-set on becoming a professor). Unfortunately, I did not know (and nobody told me about the concept of being “over-qualified, but underexperienced”). Now I bash myself for the choice I made. In retrospect, it was a horrible decision. Basically, I have trashed my life. I won’t hide it, I am incredibly bitter about it. Problem is that I had no guidance or understanding how to navigate a career; I did as I was advised (i.e., “work hard” etc.). I trashed over 10 years of my life for a hard work, that didn’t bring me anywhere.

My question to a mentor / coach would be:

1. given an itemized list of my skills, given my less than stellar resume – what jobs realistically I can apply to and get interviews?;
2. for all those jobs, that I potentially can get, what are employment conditions and compensation?

I do not want to send hundreds of resumes, to find out that I either do not have marketable skills or cannot get a salary, higher than what I have now.

In my current role, I am pushed into the backroom with no opportunities for either professional development or growth. In reality, my role is to do all the grunt work on the project, for the PI, who, being a leader, simply wants to collect awards and give TED talks. This annoys me beyond all measure. This also worries me to the point of losing sleep. I am moving between anxiety and complete apathy. I am afraid of loosing skills, of degrading, of becoming irrelevant on the job market!

I know that 99% of all advices start with “find what you want to do…”, “find your strength…”

I do not believe that this works. Yes, I do enjoy working in the lab. But I hate dealing with arrogant people and I hate abysmal pay, both of which are norm in academia. The only thing that matters in reality is a hiring manager at the other side of the table.

Today I got off the meeting with a person in our organization, who barely speaks English. How did that person ace an interview? Who the f*** hired that person? Etc. I want to find people who can provide meaningful advice, grounded in reality. Not generic fluff.

My issue is that I do not want to hear “fluff”. I get bitter and angry. Really angry. I need to understand how does the job market look like today and what are my options. Realistically. Can I get a better deal for my skills somewhere or not?

I work in microbiology at a biotech start up and we are looking to use a biosafety cabinet to prepare samples for sterility testing. I am wondering if there is any standard protocol for preparation of the samples within the BSC, any qualifications generally required in order to use the BSC for sterile processing, Environmental Monitoring required during sample manipulation, etc.? With the background of the BSC being in the micro lab and not a controlled space I’m not sure what the typical environmental requirements are for this process.

Hello everyone!

Im actually not a biotech student but im setting my mind in studying that. I came here just to ask you about your job and any suggestions you can give me facing the future. I will gladly accept all your words to me. Thank you very much and sorry for my poor english it isn't my first language

How is life at Daiichi sankyo ?

Per title,

I am a US trained MD who is about to finish his first year of surgery residency. After much thought, I have decided that I will not be pursuing surgery further, and plan to leave after the conclusion of my first year.

I don't have any recent lab experience (I did do a couple of years of cell biology research in college, but that's more than 5 years ago). I would love to get a job in BioTech in a senior scientist/associate scientist role, but it seems some of these positions do require years of recent lab experience.

I was wondering whether my MD degree could net me some leeway here? For what it's worth, I'm a quick learner, can handle long hours and tend to catch onto things fairly quickly.

Thanks in advance.

So I am in the verbal offer stage for Director FP&A role for public clinical stage biotech (bay area). External recruiter had told me role can go up to 240k base with 25% bonus + equity (said RSU/ options). I just got a verbal offer from the firm for 220k base with 20% bonus + 15,000 options (1:1 share conversion).

I was surprised the STI was lower given was told 25% all along. Is it reasonable for me to counter and keep base at 240k given lower STI? Also for equity I had mentioned I am currently at 20% of base but the options they are offering would currently only be 26K/ year in the money. I am thinking of asking for more options because their current offer would basically lateral me from my current Director role at Big pharma (210k base +20% STI+20% LTI).

I need to get back to recruiter today so appreciate any advice!!!

Hey, I'm a high school Student, just wondering if it's more beneficial to go into biomedical mathematics/ biomathematics rather than molecular biology & biotechnology/ human life science? I find all of them interesting, however which one is a better degree with more job oppotunities

I have been in bigpharma in Eastcoast for 5 years and 2month now. (R&D, preclinical development)

My starting salary was 108K base with 14% bonus, this gave me around 122K in total compensation

Been here for 5 years with 1 promotion, and now..

140K base with 17% cash bonus, 10K stock a year (vested for 3 years) = 175K in total compensation.

I have zero visibility on others' salary in our company and others.

Am I being underpaid? overpaid? just right? My original thought was I would hit 200K in 5 years, and I missed the goal...

So, I want to transfer over to the business side in 2 years. I got my bachelors 3 years ago, and I have been doing research in the industry since. I plan to take a part time MBA program soon while working as a senior research associate (hopefully associate scientist) for the next 1.5 to 2 years. For anyone who has done this transition, is this the right path to go on? If not, what path did you personally go on in order to make the switch? What job positions should I look at that are entry-level for biotech business?

I'm an international student and i wanted to purse my masters in Germany(tuition is much lower) but i wasn't able to apply due to personal reasons. as backup, i had applied to 3 Universities in the uk. eventually, i want to get a phd in molecular biology and work in the industry. However, the living expenses and tuition in London are incredibly high and salaries post masters are upto 30k a year which isn't enough to cover all expenses(it's extremely difficult to land a job as well). do u think a degree from kcl is worth it? should i wait another year and apply for the summer intake in germany? I'll finish my msc by 2025 in uk since it's a 1 year course. however, if i apply for the summer intake in 2025 for Germany, I'll finish my degree in 2027. what would be the smarter thing to do?

Top Review Highlights by Sentiment

Excerpts from user reviews, not authored by Glassdoor

Pros

"great coworkers and plenty of eye candy for the old ladies." (in 19 reviews)

"Free food days (honestly would prefer you pay us more then I can buy my own food)" (in 17 reviews)

Cons

"Pay is low." (in 27 reviews)

"Management is terrible." (in 20 reviews)

https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Santa-Cruz-Biotechnology-Reviews-E39955.htm

Im thinking about doing either process engineer in pharma I was wondering what exactly your job is if you interned there before. or if you have another role you can also mention your experience. The main thing im concern about is 1) lack of growth 2) lack of WLB.

Not really a rant but more of a frustrating lol moment. I am a third-year undergrad student and I’m still applying for internships. I’ve applied for around 50 internships in the span of a week, all in different parts of Biotech (QA, RA, R&D). For one internship I applied to, I received the confirmation email, and two hours later, I got a rejection email. Laughing right now because if I don’t, I’ll cry. 😅🤪

Hi! I am currently a prospective Biostatistics student. I have received offers at UMich for an MS in Biostat, Rice PhD in Stat, Columbia MS in Public Health Data Science, Brown MS in Biostat, and Emory MPH in Biostat. As of now, I want to veer more towards the industry. I hope to eventually work with startups or in the biotech industry.

Which schools will set myself up to succeed in the Biotech field if cost was not an issue? What skills do I need to build up wherever I go to make myself a competitive applicant? Can I progress far with a masters or will I hit a ceiling in my career?

I have been snooping around on linkedIn lately and was paying attention to the educational backgrounds and experiences of people in previously mentioned fields in the title. I noticed almost ALL of these people had gone to Ivy League PhD programs or at least a top 10, maybe a top 20. I am currently in industry now and have been for almost 3 years but will be leaving for my PhD. While I got into a few programs I am pretty happy with, I am bummed out because got rejected by all the schools that were in the top 10 or 20 that would have made it substantially easier to get into some of these roles after graduation. I am not going into a PhD program for the sole purpose of getting into these roles, but I have been really curious about them and would not want to be closed off to these roles just because I couldn't get into a T10 or 20 school. What are your experiences or thoughts on this?

Received admits for Fall 2024 entry into two different PhD programs: one at Weill Cornell in NYC and one at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy

I’m interested in drug discovery, particularly computational/ML-based. I’m interested in working in industry in the future, but not particular set on working in big pharma vs startup. Both programs seem to have a lot of resources, and both locations (NYC and the NC triangle) have many industry connections.

I figured the lab that I join would have a bigger impact on my future career. The professors at each place I would most likely be working with are pretty different:

• At Weill, the professor is an established and well-known lab, with many projects going on and many connections throughout industry and academia. However, because of this, they are more hands-off and busy. Similarly, most of my PhD would probably be individual and remote-work because most of the lab works remotely
• At UNC, the professor is younger and less-known, but they are more hands-on and getting more funding/projects each year, and they collaborate a lot within the department. It seems that working with the professor on projects is more likely than working for them. People also come into the lab more frequently. Likewise, a lot of cool projects here, but less man-power and money going into these projects

I am weighing my options at the two places, but I would love to hear from professionals in biotech/biopharma about the perception of these two schools/programs, and if there is anything else I should consider!

I saw in Linkedin that a person started at bigpharma as Sr.scientist after Ph.D,

moved to Vertex as Sr.scientist and now became a Principal scientist.

Is it right that Sr.scientist in Vertex is a position fresh Ph.D gets and Principal scientist is the next one?

Hi I am 20 and interested in doing a job as a lab tech or medical lab tech, there’s some programs around me that have biotech lab specialist programs and I am interested. Is a certificate a good idea to get into the door and get a job at lab tech? Or should I go to school for a medical lab tech and finish my AAS granted I am more just want to work in a lab and work in biotech lab or some sort. I am not 100% knowledgeable on this topic so I figured I would ask on reddit!

I'm considering getting my Master's in chemical engineering from Cornell, but I've been told it's not worth it since master's programs are just "cash cows", and I'd be graduating with about ~70K in debt from the tuition. I think my parents would help with housing, but they definitely wouldn't be able to afford the full tuition (I saved them a year's worth of tuition in undergrad, so they're willing to put it towards a master's).

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I think that getting a degree from Cornell would definitely help with job prospects/getting internships, but I just don't know if getting that debt is a bad idea financially. I'm hoping to get a job that pays ~100k somewhere in pharmaceuticals after graduating, so I think if I'm smart about my money I could pay it off in 2-3 years, but I dunno what do ya'll think?

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Would just like to hear other people's thoughts/perspectives.

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also, i did not get my undergrad from Cornell if that makes any difference

Got accepted into a PhD program, and wondering if I should join a small molecule/traditonal drug discovery lab, or a more bioinformatics/organoids-focused lab…

With all the hype around ML for drug discovery, will it be less useful for me to join a lab that used more traditional drug discovery techniques?

A couple days ago, I got accepted into genetics and plant biology at UC Berkeley! I'm conflicted between Berkeley's Genetics and Plant Biology program and UC Davis's Biotechnology program and am seeking advice on which is best for this field.

I’m passionate about plant/agricultural biotech, especially in plant breeding and genetic engineering. Food science is also pretty interesting to me- I’m considering minoring in Food Systems at Berkeley and Plant Biology at Davis.

I'm looking if anyone has any insight on whether UC Berkeley's Genetics and Plant Biology major (with a concentration in biotech) or UC Davis's Biotechnology major (with a concentration in plant biotech) align best with my interests and offer the greatest opportunities. I already know UC Davis's program is a good fit, and I know UCD is the agricultural/plant science school, but Berkeley is a great school as well and I don't know as much about the genetics/plant bio major. Tips/advice? Thank you so much :)

I’m currently a first year Civil Engineering student in Sydney Australia but decided I really don’t want to do engineering anymore and found great interest in biotech. Is biotech generally viable in Australia/ will it be over the next few years? How are the salary’s? I plan on doing a bachelor of science (major in biotech), would this be enough or would a masters be better to have alongside it? Thank you:)

Hi, I’m graduating from high school this year and I’m not sure if I should go with pure biology or biotech. I’m interested in doing cancer research.

Edit: Grateful for all the advice I got on here. Thanks so much guys!

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I am going to graduate from UCSD this summer with a B.Sc. in Biochemistry, I am currently looking for jobs in San Diego area. This is my first job finding, and I am trying my best to polish my CV. Any feedback is appreciated, thank you all! Also, what job position should I be looking for in a biotech company with a bachelor degree? Research Associate I or Lab technician?

I'm a validation scientist at a transplant lab. I havent felt happy in months. I'm working almost every day and it's still not enough for my bosses. They threaten to fire us on a weekly basis. One of our main competitors has some major dirt going on right now so we're getting a massive influx of new clients and I don't know how much more I can handle. I'm only 24 and I don't know where I can move within the same pay level since I just don't have a lot of experience requirements met. I've only been st this job for 2 years and my only other experience is clinical lab work. I'm the youngest in my department by 7 years and I'm afraid that I'm going to get stuck in this position for so much longer.

It is a little pathetic that this is one of the most enduring benefits from having worked at these companies.