Hello PhD is a bi-weekly podcast that explores the human side of science and the culture of lab life. Science is hard work, but making it through a PhD program and into a rewarding career can seem downright impossible. Wouldn't it be nice if someone shared the secrets for success at every stage? Admissions, rotations, classes, prelims, research, dissertations, job-hunting, and more. Avoid the pitfalls and find the career you love!We're excited to bring you a podcast exploring the ups and downs of biomedical research and the people who make it their life's work. We'll keep you up-to-date on the latest news, give you tips for surviving grad school, and shed light on the amazing careers of other scientists.It's like getting a PhD in getting a PhD!Hello PhD is a podcast for scientists and the people who love them. hellophd.com | @hellophd

Oversees admissions for the Biological and Biomedical Sciences Program (BBSP) in the Office of Graduate Education at UNC School of Medicine. BBSP is an umbrella admissions mechanism and first year training program for 14 biomedical PhD programs at UNC Chapel Hill. Each year BBSP recruits a class of 85-95 biomedical PhD students.

I have served as the Director of the Post-baccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP) at UNC since January 2010. The goal of PREP is to prepare talented post-baccalaureate students from groups that are under-represented (UR) in the sciences who desire to pursue a biomedical research PhD for entry and success in top graduate programs. During my time as Director, our program has transitioned over 70 UR postbac scholars into top PhD programs across the country including Stanford, UCSD, Washington (Seattle), Wash U (St. Louis), Vanderbilt, Wisconsin-Madison, Duke and UNC Chapel Hill. My graduate and postdoctoral training as a microbiologist, my experiences mentoring students at the undergraduate, post-baccalaureate, and graduate level, and the pedagogical training I received as an IRACDA (SPIRE) postdoctoral fellow have made me well suited to direct diversity initiatives like PREP and advise scholars from an array of backgrounds who are interested in pursuing biomedical research careers. I have become very interested in encouraging and empowering students at all stages of the pipeline to pursue and succeed in science and research careers.med.unc.edu/prep

In addition to directing UNC PREP, I also lead science outreach initiatives aimed at informing high school students (and especially students from underserved populations) about careers in science and demystifying science as a career path to students who have not met a scientist before. I have directed North Carolina DNA Day (ncdnaday.org) for the past five years; an initiative that annually sends over 130 scientists from North Carolina research institutions into high school classrooms statewide. I am currently building nationwide collaborations to extend the successes and outcomes of NC DNA Day to other states.ncdnaday.org | @ncdnaday

Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Virginia Miller, PhD.The role of chromosomally-encoded type III secreted effectors in Yersinia enterocoliticaDue to an interest in blending research with teaching, I applied for and received a postdoctoral fellowship with the SPIRE Postdoctoral Training program at UNC Chapel Hill. As a postdoc, I was interested in developing model systems that could be implemented in undergraduate teaching environments to study important human pathogens. In the lab of Dr. Virginia Miller, using the budding yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, I studied the function of virulence proteins secreted by the intestinal pathogen, Yersinia enterocolitica. These proteins, called Ysps, function inside of host cells; therefore, yeast were a perfect model to understand the cell biology of how these pathogenic factors function to cause disease. Further studies examining the role of protein secretion in Yersinia were conducted using Drosophila (fruit fly) cells. Preliminary results from these studies were published in 2013 (PMID: 23630961).

Graduate Research Assistant in the laboratory of Thomas Kawula, PhD.Dissertation title: Francisella tularensis interactions with the lung

Undergraduate Research Assistant in the laboratory of Mark Forsyth, PhD.Effects of two-component signal transduction systems on gene expression in Helicobacter pylori