01 Oct Petri Dishes: From the Immediate Past-Director: September 2019 Issue

Posted at 09:43h in Awards, Cardiovascular, Diabetes & Metabolic Disorders, Communication, Event Recap, Events, Funding, Funding Opportunities, News by
0 Likes

A Note From the Immediate Past-Director

This month, the Postdoc Leadership Association and the Office for Research Careers celebrated the 10th Annual National Postdoc Appreciation week with a variety of events to acknowledge the hard work of Brigham postdocs.
In recognition of Women in Medicine month, the BRI co-sponsored the 8th annual Women in Medicine & Science Symposium organized by the Office for Women’s Careers, highlighting the achievements of women faculty and trainees and building community throughout Brigham Health.
We are excited to introduce a new newsletter to the research community, Science Spotlight, that will be highlighting selected publications from high-impact journals with Brigham authorship each month. We hope you enjoy reading about the research and accomplishments of your colleagues and welcome your feedback on this newsletter.
On September 26th the BRI organized the annual meeting of Brigham Health’s external Scientific Advisory Board, a prestigious group of scientists, venture capitalists and pharmaceutical leaders who provides counsel and vision to enhance research at the Brigham.
LDiscover Brigham is fast approaching! Check out our weekly highlights of sessions and demos featured on our website and the hospital flat screens that are sure to peak your interest. Please enjoy our research paper of the month and, lastly, don’t forget that the deadline to activate your LabArchives account is tomorrow!

Thanks,

Elizabeth Petri Henske, MD

 

10th Annual National Postdoc Appreciation Week

From Monday, September 16 to Friday, September 30, we celebrated postdocs at the Brigham, recognizing all that they do for the research community here and across the nation. Below are just two of several events that took place throughout this week of appreciation. You can learn more about the Office for Research Careers and the Postdoc Leadership Association here.
Information Table on the Pike

Postdocs and others stopped by for cookies, coffee, and to learn more about the role of the Postdoc Leadership Council in the greater Brigham Community. The Postdoc Leadership Council invites all Brigham postdocs to join one of their committees and help plan events and create resources for the community.

Ice Cream Social

Postdocs and colleagues gathered to enjoy ice cream and socialize. Postdoc Leadership Council members were recognized by Dr. Laura Fredenburgh, Faculty Director, Office for Research Careers.

Women in Medicine and Science Month

On September 18th, the 8th annual Women in Medicine & Science Symposium took place in the Bornstein Amphitheater from 3:00 – 6:00pm. It is an annual event sponsored by the Center for Diversity & Inclusion, Office for Women’s Careers, Office for Research Careers, the BRI, and Connor’s Center for Women and Newborns that highlights the achievements of women faculty and trainees at BWH. The symposium focused on collaborations across disciplines including basic research, clinical research, translational research, clinical innovation and medical education. Cynthia Morton, PhD, was the keynote speaker at the event, followed by an impressive selection of oral presentations with Q&A, and poster presentations.

BRI Events Recap

Tips & Tricks for Presenting Your Poster

The RC LIVE Lunch featured Haley Bridger from the Office of Strategic Communications and Terry McGowan from the Development Office. They offered helpful tips on how to present your research and what to say to your audience, whether they are a colleague, someone from the media, or a potential donor. This lunch was held for anyone who might be participating in an upcoming poster session, but was particularly focused on those presenting at Discover Brigham.

Best Practices in Poster Design

Getting ready to design your poster? Dr. Cheryl Vaughan delivered a high-impact, practical knowledge presentation on how to make the best design “moves” to tell your scientific story on the interactive platform of an e-poster. Dr. Vaughan covered visual accessibility, the use of color, content flow and graphic cues, basic principals of data visualization, and how to convert a traditional poster to an effective e-poster.

 

Science Spotlight

We are excited to present the research community with this first edition of the Science Spotlight newsletter. It will feature publications from Brigham researchers in high-impact journals and funding updates from the prior month. The first edition was sent out on Friday, September 27th. We hope you got a chance to read it!

 

Scientific Advisory Board

From left to right: Paul Anderson, MD, PhD, Betsy Nabel, MD, Elias Zerhouni, MD, Gerald Chan, PhD, Susan Hockfield, PhD, Terry McGowan, Jeffrey Leiden, MD, PhD, Geoffrey Smith, JD, Michael Rosenblatt, MD

The annual meeting of the Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) was held on Thursday, September 26. The board came together in 2014 in order to have a congregation of hospital expertise and local industry partners dedicated to innovation and discovery. This year, distinguished leaders discussed the academic-industry interface, ranging from physical collaboration space to trainee needs. The board also heard brief presentations from the inaugural President’s Scholars who were excited to share their scientific journey and current research with the room.

 

What to Look Forward to at Discover Brigham

There are so many exciting sessions and demos this year at Discover Brigham, we encourage you to visit the BRI website, the Discover Brigham website, and keep an eye out for the rotating flat screens around the hospital, all of which will be promoting individual sessions and demos leading up to the big day! Please enjoy these snippets of information and remember to register to attend Discover Brigham on November 7.

 

Research Paper of the Month

 
Nikolaos Patsopoulos, MD, PhD
Assistant Professor of Neurology
Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Department of Neurology
Director of Systems Biology and Computational Science Program at the Ann Romney Center for Neurologic Diseases of Brigham & Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School

Dr. Patsopoulos’ findings were recently published in Science, announcing the genetic and genomic map of multiple sclerosis on behalf of the International Multiple Sclerosis Genetics Consortium (IMSGC). It is a breakthrough milestone in understanding the genetic basis of of multiple sclerosis. The “study explains approximately half of the heritability of MS, establishing MS as one of the well-characterized common diseases in terms of their genetic architecture,” says Dr. Patsopoulos.
Read the full article here. Read the official press release here.

Activate Your LabArchives Account!

The deadline for PIs to activate their accounts and begin using LabArchives is TOMORROW: October 1st, 2019. Please be sure to use your Partners username and password to activate your account. Click here to activate your account today! You can also view the Partners Electronic Lab Notebook (ELN) Policy here.
You can also view all past Quick Tips here.