Laura Beer Email & Phone Number

Peterborough, United Kingdom

Peterborough, United Kingdom

Brisbane, Australia

An administrative role within the national office of the Australian Institute of Medical Scientists.Provided both executive and administrational support including acting as receptionist & first point of contact for all incoming calls, email & mail processing.Produced & distributed communication materials to our membership including monthly newsletters using the CRM database & administered the company social media pages.Administered the skilled migration Qualifications Assessment & Membership Assessment programs.Planned & hosted the inaugural AIMS Queensland Medical Science Awards. To ensure the successful delivery of this event• I designed all promotional material, & drew up the application form & sponsorship packages.• I engaged with relevant companies to sell the event & the sponsorship opportunities available. I also worked with the CEO to follow up any leads to lock in our eventual sponsors & ensure the event was a financial success.• Actively promoting the event to our members we were able to attract a high calibre of award nominees & applicants. I then worked up profiles & references on all applicants to be used by the judging panel.• Engaging with a number of Queensland Government departments on protocol and media requirements, I facilitated the attendance of the Queensland Minister for Health (representing the Queensland Premier), the Queensland Minister for Science & Innovation and the Queensland Chief Scientist. I also worked with the CEO to ensure the attendance of a number of industry VIPs from across Australia.• I drafted a series of media releases promoting the event, & its eventual winners, & liaised with local & statewide media contacts, resulting in a number of articles & radio news items being run across Queensland in the run up to, & following the event.• I worked closely with our principle sponsor (ANZ Bank) to manage event logistics at their corporate office & to ensure the event ran smoothly on the night.

Brisbane, Australia

Demonstrated crucial organisational & time-management skills to perform a multifaceted role balancing the duties & workload of administrative assistant, lab manager & research assistant in the Cancer Genetics Laboratory.PA to the head of the Cancer Program initially then to the head of the Genetics & Computational Biology Department. Worked closely with program & team heads in the department, as well as the administration & finance teams.Administrative assistant for the Cancer Genetics lab, & as needed, administrative support for all the team heads within the Cancer Program.Planned events such as the Brisbane Breast Cancer Research Group Meeting & the Brisbane Gynaecological Cancer Research Symposium.Completed a number of large scale organisational projects:Transitioned the lab cryogenics storage from liquid nitrogen, with index card records to vapour-phase with an online database. Was a member of the QIMR Berghofer Cryogenics Storage Steering Committee to advise on the layout of a new cryogenics storage facility.Established a inventory of GMOs stored in the lab to satisfy OGTR obligations.Migrated all lab project-specific health and safety documentation, human and animal ethics approvals and OGTR registrations onto a new eforms system. Developed a complete set of SOPs to cover all cloning & tissue culture protocols used &drafted general lab safety/housekeeping guidelines & induction documentation for new starters. Performed routine blood processing and DNA extraction for the OPAL study.Banked & performed QC on all new cells lines in the lab, also performed routine tissue culture for Post-Docs, providing reagents as needed.Provided basic molecular biology support for cloning projects.Gave regular talks to tour groups visiting the institute & was commended by the community relations officer for my passion & enthusiasm in interacting with members of the public & for the positive reception my talks received.

Brisbane, Australia

Spearheaded the use & management of the new Biocel assay platform, bringing the system online & working with engineers & product specialists to write protocols & fully validate the system upon installation. As platform manager I instigated a thorough QC & maintenance schedule & also developed a new costings/charging structure to allow the platform to be used on a fee-for-service basis. Utilising problem solving & assay development skills I oversaw the smooth transition of multiple manually optimised screens onto the automated robotics platform.Wrote documentation pertaining to the use of the platform, including SOPs, Risk Assessments & screen planning documentation, & also produced a series of detailed user guides & maintenance schedules, which I then used as a training framework. This system rolled out & my role expanded to cover management of, & training for, all liquid handling devices & plate reading devices in the lab.Demonstrating flexibility & the ability to quickly pick up new techniques, I provided emergency staff cover & stepped in a role within the natural chemistry laboratory performing high-throughput Solid Phase Extraction of Naturebank biota.Compelted Quarantine Accredited Person training & contributed to the running of the institute’s biota library, Naturebank, curating the library, distributing samples & facilitating the gamma-irradiation of quarantine materials for use outside of the Quarantine Accredited Premises. I spearheaded work to safeguard the long-term security of the Naturebank by establishing a secure secondary library that could be stored offsite.Coordinated mycoplasma testing within the biology lab, I also took on more responsibility, filing a vital support role. As lab supervisor for the main biology lab, I ensured that all housekeeping & cleaning tasks were performed in a timely manner & I administrated the communal E-freezer. I was the Designated First Aid Officer & provided cover for administrative tasks when required.

Brisbane, Australia

Liaising with both operations management & both internal & external engineers, I utilised my previous experience with the SelecT automation system to trouble-shoot issues regarding the laboratory environment at the facility, enabling the new CompacT SelecT to be brought fully online. I then instigated a maintenance & QC program to facilitate optimal system performance.Establishing a series of newly designed protocols I then transitioned a number of manually cultured cell lines, including Olfactory Ensheathing Cells, Neurosphere-derived cells & Embryonic Feeder cells, onto the automated system.Expanding on my work with the automated system, I contributed to manual cell culture work within the Human Tissue Culture lab. Routinely culturing & banking Primary human Olfactory Mucosal Cell lines, generating Neurospheres & banking expanded cell lines I also coordinated & performed the routine testing of all cell lines for mycoplasma contamination using both the MycoAlert kit & more traditional Hoechst staining/microscopy.Performed cell culture work instrumental in a study more thoroughly defining the phenotype of the key Olfactory Neurosphere cell type & evaluating the robustness of the centre’s cell culture techniques, proving that current practises cause no alterations in phenotype over time.

Brisbane, Australia

Working in a small multidisciplinary Research & Development team I was solely responsible for planning & performing all cell based in vitro angiogenesis assays within the group, including both routine assays & on a more ad hoc basis any requested by the Manager of Preclinical Development, Vice President of Business Development, or the CEO, often with very short lead times & tight deadlines. This required me to be very flexible, quickly becoming proficient in a number of new techniques & assay methodologies. This can be exemplified by my work developing & bringing in house a small-scale Heparanase expression/production system utilising baculovirus transfection of suspension insect cells.Managing both the lab & the company cell bank I expanded my role to act as lab administrator for the entire R&D group, liaising with sales reps, stocktaking & purchasing both lab & office consumables, invoicing & organising provision of servicing for a wide range of lab equipment.Regularly attending & presenting at R&D group & company-wide strategic planning meetings I was able to not only share my results & knowledge, but I was also able to expand my understanding of the pharmaceutical industry as a whole, particularly in the areas of clinical trials, intellectual property, commercialisation & outsourcing. This led to me assisting the company Quality Manager during a rewrite of company quality policy & documentation.

Sandwich, United Kingdom

Championing the SelecT automated cell culture platform. I project managed & coordinated the day-to-day robot running. Liaising with clients I ascertained weekly & long-term requirements of each project, scheduling protocols appropriately. I instigated a system of maintaining back up cultures which could be used in the event of platform errors/malfunctions. I established a regular QC & preventative maintenance schedule, trouble-shooting as required, to optimise platform performance.I transitioned multiple labour-intensive assays onto the robot, improving productivity & reducing the man power required to run an assay (e.g. a reduction from 0.35 to 0.06 FTE). I also demonstrated through innovatively data tracking a clear improvement in data quality & assay robustness. I presented this data at an international interest group meeting & was part of an interdisciplinary team responsible for investigating possible improvements to group data recording & collection.Developing very close relationships with my customers, as Project Lead I closely monitored short-term reagent requirements & output quality, whilst planning strategically to ensure maintenance of uninterrupted reagent supply in the long-term. Managing multiple projects simultaneously, my forward planning meant rapidly changing customers’ needs could still be met. Supervising a school-leaver my ability to communicate & pass on relevant technical expertise was vital in both their initial training & further development. I established a close working relationship with my supervisee, monitoring & balancing their workload whilst ensuring that quality standards were met & maintained.I undertook work of an exploratory nature honing new techniques & developing new cell lines & process improvement methods. As Safety steward for 3 labs, i performed inspections, dealt with issues, ensured compliance requirements were met & drafted reports for the Health & Safety committee as well as chairing bi-weekly group meetings.

Cambridge, United Kingdom

I interned in the C. elegans group, where I demonstrated a flexible attitude within the lab, performing a wide variety of tasks and rapidly acquiring new skills in molecular biology, as required, to accommodate changing group priorities.I completed full and thorough record keeping, including both methodologies and results.

Cambridge, United Kingdom

Working part time during initially during weekends and then during school and university holidays I gained valuable customer service skills and experience.Demonstrated good organisational and time management skills, balancing regular shifts with full time education, whilst maintaining high levels of academic achievement.

Cambridge, United Kingdom

Provided clerical support for a busy medical practise, singlehandedly clearing a 3-year backlog of unfiled patient records and letters.Proactively used scheduling and appointment information to ensure that my work did not prevent patient records being available to doctors and other staff when required. Dealt with confidential patient records in a professional and discrete manner.

Bsc (Hons), Genetics, First Class

Dissertation title : Functional Analysis of YML059c the Yeast Homologue of Human Neuropathy Target Esterase.

A Levels, Biology, Chemistry, General Studies And Maths With Statistics, 3 As And 1 C

Gcses, Double Science, Design Technology, English Lit. Maths, Geography, French, Drama & English Lang., 3 A*, 6 A And 1 B

Activities and Societies: Bikesheds Theatre Group