Episodes

  • Exploring Biotech Frontiers with Dr. Rita Avelar

    Exploring Biotech Frontiers with Dr. Rita Avelar
    Mar 9 2026
    Join us in this insightful episode as we sit down with Dr. Rita Avelar, a lead scientist at CircNova. Discover her inspiring journey from academia to the forefront of biotech innovation. Dr. Avelar shares her experiences transitioning from a postdoc at the University of Michigan to leading groundbreaking research in RNA therapeutics. Learn about the unique challenges and opportunities in the startup world, the importance of networking, and how diverse experiences can shape a successful career in science. Whether you're an aspiring scientist or curious about the biotech industry, this episode offers valuable insights and advice. Tune in to explore the dynamic world of biotech with Dr. Avelar! "[…] there's definitely a supportive environment and communication that has to happen between you and your postdoctoral mentor in order for them to even know how to help you." Dr. Rita Avelar Guest Rita Avelar obtained her PhD in Molecular and Cellular Pathology from the University of Michigan in 2023. She completed her postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan in 2025, and is now Lead Scientist of Research and Translational Discovery at CircNova. With her team, she aims to leverage their NovaEngine™️AI-platform to discover novel and more durable non-coding RNA therapeutics, to target the undruggable and unlock new treatment options for patients with unmet clinical needs. Connect with Rita on LinkedIn Resources Luck is no Accident: Making the Most of Happenstance in Your Life and Career, book by John D. Krumboltz and Al S. Levin Transcript Anne-Sophie Bohrer Hello everyone and welcome to 'What's Up, Doc?', an initiative developed by the University of Michigan Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. 'What's Up, Doc?' is a professional development interview series created to support the career exploration effort and professional development needs of current U-M postdocs. You will hear from former U-M postdocs discuss their own postdoc experience and share advice on their experience transitioning into their career of choice. We hope you will get the answers you want and need to make an informed decision about your own career. I am Anne-Sophie Bohrer Maurinne Bonnet And I am Maurinne Bonnet. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Today our guest is Doctor Rita Avelar, who completed her postdoc at the University of Michigan in 2025. Rita is now the lead scientist of research and translational discovery at CircNova in Ann Arbor. Welcome Rita and thank you for joining us. Rita Avelar Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here. Maurinne Bonnet Hi Rita, welcome. Before we dive into what you actually do in your new job, could you please introduce yourself and, with a bit of your background, how did you end up doing your postdoc at the U of M? Rita Avelar Yeah. So I started my postdoc right after I graduated from my PhD, also at the University of Michigan. I did my PhD with Doctor DiFeo in the pathology department and it felt like the right fit for me to stay a little longer to continue the project that I had during my PhD to see it published and also to expand my expertise from this lab and actually leverage their collaborations at the time, which actually led me to the job that I have today. Anne-Sophie Bohrer So you work for CircNova. Can you tell us a little bit about that company and what they do? Rita Avelar Yeah. So CircNova is actually a biotech that is located in Ann Arbor here in Michigan. And what we do, we use our AI driven drug discovery to accelerate the development of RNA therapeutics. So what that really means is that we are using our proprietary AI Nova engine technology in order to help us predict the RNA structure, binding affinities and biological function to help us engineer new medicines and therapeutic approaches and hope to treat human disease. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Very cool. So like I said earlier, you're the lead scientist. So can you tell us a little bit about what this role entails, what it's like, what it looks like day-to-day? Rita Avelar Yeah. So as the lead scientist, what I really do is to establish and direct all CircNova's experimental biology programs and platforms. So what I really do, and what I'm responsible to do, is to bridge the molecular biology in human disease with the drug discovery to accelerate CircNova's pipeline from early stage innovation to hopefully translational discovery. So my day-to-day really is to help design, execute, and oversee the wet lab research. So I seek to validate all the RNA therapeutics that are generated through our AI and then advance the discovery platforms and introduce the therapeutic programs that we have in collaboration with other biotechs as well as academic institutions. Anne-Sophie Bohrer So it seems that you collaborate with a lot of people. So how many people work at CircNova? Rita Avelar Yeah. So we actually are a smaller biotech right now. We've been around for about two years and right now we are a total of 11 employees. Anne-Sophie Bohrer...
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    31 mins
  • Building a Career in Tech Transfer: Insights from Dr. Megan Griffin

    Building a Career in Tech Transfer: Insights from Dr. Megan Griffin
    Mar 9 2026
    Megan Griffin holds a BS in Biotechnology and Molecular Biology from Michigan State University and obtained her PhD in Developmental and Molecular Biology from the University of Cincinnati. She completed her postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan in 2020 and later was an U-M Innovation Partnerships fellow from 2020 to 2022. Megan is now the Assistant Director of Licensing at U-M Innovation Partnerships. In her role, she guides U-M innovators through the process of protecting their intellectual property and commercializing it through licensing to an interested company or creating a new startup venture. Connect with Megan on LinkedIn Resources U-M Innovation Partnerships miLEAD Consulting GroupNucleateNSF I-Corps program Transcript Anne-Sophie Bohrer Hello everyone and welcome to 'What's Up, Doc?', an initiative developed by the University of Michigan Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. 'What's Up, Doc?' is a professional development interview series created to support the career exploration efforts and professional development needs of current U-M postdocs. You will hear from former U-M postdocs discuss their own postdoc experience and share advice on their experience transitioning into their career of choice. We hope you will get the answers you want and need to make an informed decision about your own career. I am Anne-Sophie Bohrer Maurinne Bonnet And I am Maurinne Bonnet. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Today, our guest is Doctor Megan Griffin, who completed her postdoc at the University of Michigan in 2020. Megan is now working at the University of Michigan Innovation Partnerships as an Assistant Director of licensing. Welcome, Megan, and thank you for joining us. Megan Griffin Thank you for having me. Maurinne Bonnet Hey, Megan, it's a pleasure to have you today. So as Anne-Sophie said, you are currently working at Innovation Partnerships, so for some, some of us who are not familiar with that, could you briefly tell us more about this office, what are its main missions, what what are you doing there? Megan Griffin Sure. Yeah. So Innovation Partnerships was recently rebranded, used to be the Office of Technology Transfer here at the University of Michigan. And we rebranded really to capture a wider array of things that we do. So we're sort of divided into 3 branches. I work with the licensing team, we have a ventures team and we have our corporate and foundation research alliances team. So collectively, all of these groups work closely together, and our overall mission is really to help faculty or students or staff, whoever at the university that has innovative research, get that research out to the public. So really our our core mission statement is that we want every piece of research at the University of Michigan have the opportunity to impact the world. So we do this by helping to protect intellectual property that can be in the form of patents or copyrights or, you know, sometimes we can license things without protection, and then we also will try to get it to the world, either through licensing that to companies, help people create their own startup companies, uhm connect people with funding resources, that's another thing we do. So we have a couple of internal translation funds that we manage that are meant to fund the gaps in research to get it to a point where it's ready to be commercialized. And we also have investment funds for creating startup ventures. Uhm, so it's kind of, you know, overall the overarching goal of our office. And if you want to know more about the specific branches, I can get into more detail. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Cool. Well, that's really interesting. Uhm, so clearly you're still somehow and somewhat involved with the science, uhm, but you're not at the bench anymore, you're not in the lab anymore. And so can you tell us a little bit about your background and really what led you to choose to pursue this career? Megan Griffin Yeah, absolutely. So my background is in life sciences, I got a PhD at the University of Cincinnati in molecular and developmental biology. As I was wrapping up my graduate career, I was starting to think about what I wanted to do overall and I hadn't really quite settled on a career path. That was the first time I heard of tech transfer and I thought" Huh, that sounds kind of interesting, let me find out more." So I met with the tech transfer office at the Children's Hospital where I was doing my research, and sort of found out more about the career, but at that point I was about to graduate, it was a little late to get involved with them, uhm, and they told me that, you know, some schools have these internship opportunities available that you might be able to do if you choose to do a postdoc or something like that or maybe you can directly apply. So I decided to do a postdoc to keep my options open, so to speak. I hadn't totally ruled out the traditional route of, uhm, you know, trying to get a professor position, uhm, but I was sort of leaning ...
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    27 mins
  • From Bench Science to Sales with Dr. Emily Sherman

    From Bench Science to Sales with Dr. Emily Sherman
    Mar 9 2026
    Emily Sherman holds a BS in Chemistry from Ithaca College and obtained her PhD in chemical biology in 2020 at the University of Michigan. She then completed her postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan in 2021. Emily is an Account Executive for Takara, a life sciences regents company, where she started as Territory Manager. She manages a portfolio of clients across multiple states in the midwest, ensuring customer satisfaction and managing the sales cycle. As a fun fact, Emily has spent several months sailing around the world as a passenger on a ship in 2015. Connect with Emily on LinkedIn Resources miLEAD Consulting GroupU-M Innovation Partnerships How to Use the STAR Interview Response Technique (Indeed, Oct. 2, 2025) Transcript Anne-Sophie Bohrer Hello everyone and welcome to 'What's up, Doc?', an initiative developed by the University of Michigan Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. "What's Up, Doc?' is a professional development interview series created to support the career exploration efforts and professional development needs of current UM postdocs. You will hear from former UM postdocs discuss their own postdoc experience and share advice on their experience transitioning into their career of choice. We hope you will get the answers you want and need to make an informed decision about your own career. I am Anne-Sophie Bohrer. Maurinne Bonnet And I am Maurinne Bonnet. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Today we are joined by our guest, Doctor Emily Sherman. Emily obtained her Ph.D. in chemical biology from the University of Michigan in 2020 and completed her postdoc in the Michigan Medical School in 2021. After her postdoc Emily joined Takara as a territory manager, where she is now an accounts manager. Welcome, Emily, and thank you for joining us. Emily Sherman Thank you guys for having me. I'm excited to chat. Maurinne Bonnet Yeah. We're so excited to have you here. So, Emily, like Anne-Sophie said, you are currently working at Takara. So I guess the first question would be, could you briefly tell us about your company? What are you guys doing there? Emily Sherman Yeah, for sure. So Takara Bio is a Japanese company, we have a wholly owned subsidiary in the U.S. called Takara Bio USA. So you know we think of like Thermo as kind of the Amazon of the life sciences reagents company. Takara is like a smaller vendor in that same space. So at the core, we're an enzyme company, so a lot of people know us for things like polymerases, cloning, Next Gen. sequencing, but we've really expanded into a lot of other areas like cell and gene therapy. Kind of anything molecular biology we have reagents for so, we have thousands of products all across kind of the life sciences. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Great. So Emily, let's go back to 2021. When you transition from a bench position to a sales role. So how did you choose to pursue this career and when did you make that choice? Emily Sherman Yeah. So you know what's funny is sales was really not on my radar at all admittedly. When I was, you know, in my training for PhD and postdoc, I didn't even really know that it was an option, to be honest with you, my, my only experience with sales reps in the lab would be like, you know, the pipette people, the gloves people, that kind of just come barging into the lab and (laugh) ask you who you're getting your plastics from. And, you know, they leave a flyer or something and leave. So a recruiter actually reached out to me for my current role, and honestly, when she first called me and asked, you know, Iis this something you ever thought about as a career?" I was kind of like, uhm, no (laughs). Like honestly I was, I was not sure if I was interested and she was like "You know, just let me send you the the job descriptions, what kind of person Takara specifically was looking for." And they were interested in, like, someone with a science background, a Ph.D. So, you know, it was, it was really tough times. Like, I defended my Ph.D. in 2020 and I I did a postdoc with my mentor kind of knowing he was just opening his first lab and he really knew the whole time that, you know, I was really just looking for my next position. Uhm, so I was kind of job searching, it was during the pandemic. It was just a really tough time to find jobs, much like it is now to be totally honest with you. So you know this recruiter reached out and I was like "You know, at least you know it would allow me to stay here in Michigan." I was looking to move into industry and I did not want to move to the coast. So a lot of times, if you want a career in like R&D in biotech space, you kind of have to move to like San Diego, San Francisco, Boston, maybe New York. And I really wanted to stay here in the Midwest and it's a lot of, like, small startups and it's kind of tough to find positions in, you know, the Ann Arbor area specifically. So that's why I was open to this recruiter when she talked to me and I looked through the job description. When I looked at the salary, ...
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    31 mins
  • Navigating Career Paths in Academia and Beyond

    Navigating Career Paths in Academia and Beyond
    Mar 9 2026
    In this first episode of "What's Up, Doc?", Dr. Kaylee Steen shares her insights on career exploration and professional growth for postdocs, highlighting pivotal programs supporting the personal and professional development of Postdoctoral Fellows at U-M. She opens up about her own journey from graduate school to her current leadership role, emphasizing the importance of understanding personal strengths and the value of skill development. Tune in to discover strategies for navigating the complexities of the postdoc journey, and finding your path in academia and beyond! "You have to commit to the process and you have to dedicate time to it." Dr. Kaylee Steen Guest Kaylee Steen is the Associate Director of Professional Development and Trainee Support at the University of Michigan Medical School in the Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (OGPS). Kaylee directs the Professional Growth, Inclusion & Well-Being team who offers a suite of services and programming for graduate students and postdoctoral research fellows. Kaylee also serves as the Medical School leader supporting postdoc affairs, including advocating for equitable postdoc policies and training. The collective goal of Kaylee's team is to help trainees thrive academically, professionally and personally while at the University of Michigan and beyond. Kaylee holds a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. She completed her postdoctoral training at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor in the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology and is one of the inaugural fellows of the University of Michigan Medical School's Research Operations, Management & Strategy (ROMS) fellowship. Connect with Kaylee on LinkedIn Resources Michigan Medicine Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies (OGPS) University of Michigan Medical School's Research Operations, Management & Strategy (ROMS) fellowshipMichigan Institute for Clinical and Health Research (MICHR)Biointerfaces InstituteCenter for Research on Learning & Teaching (CRLT) Preparing Future Faculty (PFF) seminarTeaching Foundations SeriesPostdoctoral Short Course on College Teaching in STEM Developing Future Biologists (DFB) Macomb Correctional Facility Lecture Program (U-M Postdoctoral Association Outreach opportunities webpage) Transcript Anne-Sophie Bohrer Hello everyone and welcome to 'What's Up, Doc?', an initiative developed by the University of Michigan Office of Postdoctoral Affairs. 'What's Up, Doc?' is a professional development interview series created to support the career exploration efforts and professional development needs of current U-M postdocs. You will hear from former U-M postdocs, discuss their own postdoc experience, and share advice on their experience transitioning into their career of choice. We hope you will get the answers you want and need to make an informed decision about your own career. I am Anne-Sophie Bohrer. Maurinne Bonnet And I am Maurinne Bonnet. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Today our guest is Dr. Kaylee Steen who completed her postdoc at the University of Michigan in 2021. Kaylee is now the Associate Director of Professional Development and Trainee Support in the University of Michigan Medical School Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies, or OGPS for short. Welcome Kaylee and thank you for joining us. Kaylee Steen Hello, thank you for having me. Good morning. Maurinne Bonnet Hi Kaylee. So as Anne-Sophie just mentioned you work at the OGPS. So could you tell us a little bit more what is the OGPS office? What are you doing? What is their main mission there? Kaylee Steen Yeah, so at OGPS, we are in the medical school within the University of Michigan, and specifically we sit within the Office of Research, but our mission is really the educational arm of the medical school. And more specifically, we focus on education for biomedical researchers. So we don't have a hand in the medical education for MDs. We really focus on PhDs in training as well as postdocs. I oversee a team that kind of broadly focuses on professional growth, inclusion, and well-being. So we do workshops, have resources, advising, counseling to help people really with all aspects of their training and their career journey outside of the lab. So focusing on things like career exploration, professional skill building and competency building, more kind of personal development and holding events and activities that focus on belonging and really kind of celebrating our community and the different places and backgrounds people are coming from. And then, of course, overall well-being. And so we have two licensed therapist clinicians on our team that do therapy as well for our trainees. Maurinne Bonnet Oh, okay. I didn't know about the therapy. Anne-Sophie Bohrer That's amazing. Yeah. Maurinne Bonnet So you said you were mostly providing resources and programs, workshops for all the well-being and professional development. Would you maybe describe two ...
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    38 mins
  • Welcome to "What's Up, Doc?"

    Welcome to "What's Up, Doc?"
    Mar 9 2026
    The hosts of the "What's Up, Doc?" podcast, Maurinne Bonnet and Anne-Sophie Bohrer, walk you through the genesis of this initiative and their intentions behind creating a podcast to support the professional and career development of U-M Postdoctoral Fellows. Transcript Anne-Sophie Bohrer My name is Anne-Sophie Bohrer and I am the Program Manager for Professional Development in the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs at the University of Michigan. Maurinne Bonnet Hello, everyone. My name is Maurinne Bonnet, and I'm currently wrapping up my postdoc journey at the U of M in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry at the College of Pharmacy. Anne-Sophie Bohrer So welcome everyone to 'What's Up, Doc?', which is a new initiative that Maurinne is going to talk to us about. Maurinne Bonnet Yeah, sure. So 'What's Up, Doc?' is actually a professional development interview series created by Anne-Sophie and I to support the career exploration efforts and professional development needs of current U of M postdocs. So we actually created that as an alternative and low commitment way for postdocs to engage in professional development activities. And so maybe Anne-Sophie, you can talk to us a little bit of where the idea came from. Anne-Sophie Bohrer Yeah, absolutely. So for this, a little bit of background about me. So I was a postdoc myself, and realizing that I didn't want to go into a faculty career, I had to go through this whole existential crisis of figuring out what my career was going to look like. And I realized that by doing this, I realized that first of all, I was very much not informed about what was available to me to participate in professional development activities in my campus. But I also realized that it was going to take me a lot of time and a lot of effort to pivot and transition into a new career. And so from the bench, it took me about three solid years to really figure out what career I wanted to go into, which is the career that I am in right now. And so really, the idea of 'What's Up, Doc?' was to help postdocs at U of M, essentially start their career exploration journey and specifically understand the importance of informational interviews in the process of career exploration and career transition. And so for this, Maurinne, you too have a bit of a specific journey you're in right now that's also contributed to creating this initiative. Maurinne Bonnet Yeah, absolutely. So actually I'm wrapping up almost my third year of postdoc and I started realizing probably like a year ago that I didn't want to stay at the bench. I didn't want to become a PI for so many reasons. And the same, I was like, what is out there? What type of career can I pursue? How can I use my PhD and my postdoc experience? How do I compete with people that are already in the job market? And just like when you open LinkedIn and you're like, okay, let's find a job. What is the keyword you're gonna look for, you know? So same, I started doing some IDP, so personal development plan, trying to look for other alternative career. And like you said, it just takes time and effort. And then you start connecting with somebody who is, you know, has this type of job and you're like, oh, that sounds cool. Okay, you dig more and you're like, oh, actually I don't like that. Okay, go back to the starting point. Let's find somebody else in another type of career. So you contact them, try to discuss with them. And you're like, that sounds cool, but actually not for me. And so all of these, on top of your like full-time job at the bench mentoring student, when you're inexperienced, it takes time and effort. And like when you go home, after all of that, you just don't want to spend more time digging on the internet and like what is out there. So I was like, if I could just put something in my ears, listening to people talking about their career, their journey, just to give me an idea of like what they're doing and so later on I can contact them for a follow-up question, but I would have like the first idea without me doing anything. It's just the podcast talks to me basically. So that's how, like my background and how I thought like, we might need this like initiative and who's better than you to do that set up the podcast with. So that's how we started. Anne-Sophie Bohrer And it was really serendipitous that you reached out to me to schedule an advising session with me. And turns out we're both from France. Maurinne Bonnet Yay! Anne-Sophie Bohrer So we could connect, right? We had that shared experience of coming to the US to do a postdoc, realizing we wanted to stay in the US and having to figure out what we wanted to do. And so I think it was really, right, the right time, perfect storm for us to meet and essentially have the same idea, but just meeting someone else to help us get this off the ground. So this is how 'What's Up, Doc?' was born. So now what we really want you all to understand is what the benefits of listening to ...
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    10 mins