Following the success of the first seminar, which was held on 25 January with over 100 attendees, the Croatian Science Foundation and the Association of Croatian-American Professionals (ACAP) are resuming the Career Path Seminar series for young scientists, which features excellent Croatian scientists in Croatia and abroad, who, by presenting their career stories, want to inspire young researchers in Croatia and help them find their own path that suits them best.

We would hereby like to announce the second Career Path Seminar, which will be held on Tuesday, 23 February at 17.00 CET via Zoom. This seminar will feature four scientists holding the position of Research Group Leaders – two working in academia and two working in the pharmaceutical industry. They will reveal what the job of Group Leader entails, what qualities a candidate for such a position should posess and how to advance in such a career.

The seminar will be held in English.

Panel 1 (17:05-17:50) – Group Leaders in academia

• Dea Slade, PhD– BSc/MSc in Molecular Biology and Pharmacy from the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Science and Faculty of Pharmacy and Biochemistry; PhD, Summa Cum Laude with Prof. Miroslav Radman at the University of Paris 6 Pierre et Marie Curie, France; Postdoctoral training with Dr. Ivan Ahel at the Paterson Institute for Cancer Research, Manchester, UK. Currently: Group Leader at Max Pertuz Labs, Vienna, Austria.
• Dr. Nenad Ban, PhD – BSc/MSc in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, Summa Cum Laude, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Science; PhD in Biochemistry, Minor in Computer Science, with Prof. Alex McPherson at the University of California at Riverside, USA; Postdoctoral training with Prof. Thomas A. Steitz Yale University, Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry. He started his Group leader career as an assistant professor at ETH Zürich, Switzerland, where he advanced to the full professor position. Currently: Professor of Structural Molecular Biology at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Biophysics, ETH Zürich.

Panel 2 (17:50-18:30) – Group Leaders in industry

• Domagoj Vučić, PhD– BSc/MSc in Molecular Biology, Faculty of Science, University of Zagreb; PhD with Prof. L.K. Miller at the University of Georgia, SAD; postdoctoral training at Genentech where he started his career in pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. Currently: Principal Scientist, Genentech (Roche Pharmaceuticals), USA.
• Pavel Strop, PhD– BSc/MSc in biochemistry at the University of Arizona, USA; PhD with Prof. Douglas C. Reese and Prof. Steven L. Mayo at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), USA; postdoctoral training with Prof. Axel T. Brunger at Stanford University, USA. He started his career in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry at Pfizer (Oncology-Rinat) as a Senior scientist and advanced to the position of the Director for protein biochemistry. Currently: Executive Director, Discovery Biotherapeutics at Bristol Myers Squibb, USA

Seminar Moderator: Sandra Vidak, PhD – Postdoctoral Fellow at the National Cancer Institute, NIH, Bethesda, USA

Participants are invited to register for the seminar via the following registration form. The link to the Zoom meeting will be sent to all registered participants to the email address provided in the registration form. For more information about the seminar please contact dario@hrzz.hr.