The Moral of the Story

Because the Gordon Research Conferences play a prominent role in defining and discovering the frontiers of scientific research, it is not unusual to hear someone state that GRC has had a significant impact on his or her career. I have certainly said the same about GRC’s effect on my own professional path.

I was a postdoc at Northwestern University when I attended my first GRC–the Electron Donor Acceptor Interactions Conference–where I got hints about how to apply for faculty positions. (I also learned all I ever needed to know about long-range electron transfer.) As a junior, untenured assistant professor at Pennsylvania State University (Penn State), I highly valued speaking opportunities at Gordon Conferences. My attendance and presentation at the Electrochemistry GRC was important for establishing connections with people interested in the niche I was carving out at the juncture of nanoparticles, interface science, and biosensors. During my tenure as a professor of chemistry at Penn State I became a frequent attendee at the Chemistry at Interfaces, Clusters, Nanocrystals, and Nanostructures and the Bioanalytical Sensors conferences.

GRC also played an important role in my choice to forsake academia and tenure at Penn State for the thrills (and chills) of entrepreneurship. A talk I gave at the Bio-analytical Sensors GRC struck a chord with an industrial attendee from Affymax, Inc., and led to a collaborative research program with my lab, which, in turn, opened the door to my consultancy with the company. As interest in our work at Penn State grew among biotech and pharmaceutical companies, I presented a business plan to the now-former CEO of Affymax , Gordon Ringold, that laid out possible commercialization opportunities for the new technologies we were developing. He liked it, but pointed out that my dual role as Affymax chief science officer and full professor at Penn State was a nonstarter to prospective investors. I had to pick one or the other. So I chose to stay with Affymax, and the rest, for better or worse, is history.

The moral of the story is that the Gordon Conferences provide a unique forum to present and hear about science at the absolute cutting edge. For me as both a speaker and a listener, the GRC experience has prompted important career consequences spanning academia and industry. Whether for technical education or career development, I cannot think of a better way for science professionals to spend time out of the lab or office than attending a Gordon Conference.