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May 21, 2009 Contact: Georgia State helps to showcase biotechnology in the Peach State
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ATLANTA - Georgia State University showcased its bioscience expertise and research during the 2009 Bio International Convention, held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta May 18-21.
Sponsored by the Biotechnology Industry Organization, the convention was the largest biotechnology convention in the world with tens of thousands in attendance. It also featured exhibitors from more than 1,800 biotechnology companies, research institutions, academic institutions, and state and national governments.
As part of the Georgia Pavilion, the university promoted its research centers, consortiums and institutes, including the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience, the Center for Biotechnology and Drug Design, the Neuroscience Institute, the Molecular Basis of Disease initiative and the university's Viral Immunology Center Ñ home to one of only two Biosafety-Level 4 laboratories based at a university in the United States.
Georgia State also participated in conversations about how universities can help to move highly trained graduates from the academic environment to places in the biotechnology workforce Ñ a key element in Georgia's efforts to attract biotech industries to the state.
"Universities have a variety of important roles in the development of the biotechnology industry, ranging from research innovation to the development of the work force." said Elliott Albers, Regents Professor of neuroscience and director of the multi-institution Center for Behavioral Neuroscience, headquartered at Georgia State. "To be most effective at growing biotechnology, there needs to be strong partnerships between universities and industry."
Albers said there are several approaches to help this effort. One is to change the way universities structure their curriculums.
"We can also go further by providing truly interdisciplinary programs, where we bring not only science, law and business to the table, but also biotechnology professionals so that they can help to find an appropriate curriculum at the undergraduate, graduate and doctoral levels," Albers explained.
He added that universities must play a key role in changing a culture where the focus is often geared primarily to train graduate and post-graduate students to enter the academic realm, and not necessarily toward industry.
Several of Georgia State's graduate and doctoral students met with research and industry entities at the conference by helping to explain the university's ongoing research programs.
"I've made a lot of connections and done a lot of networking that I would not have an opportunity to do otherwise," said Sarah Coffey, an incoming Ph.D. student in applied and environmental microbiology
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