Highly interactive, scientifically interesting, and informal. Reflecting on the second edition of the YRI symposium on life science, two of the organisers, Daniel Sarabi and Swati Aggarwal, identifies the diverse and to the point talks, the career day and the networking opportunities as key for its success.

People pictured in a room, different pictures. College. Photo. — Participants and speakers pictured at YRI on life science at LINXS in April.

The event took place on 23-24th of April, gathered around 30 participants, and featured presentations on topics connected to life science with focus on X-rays and neutrons.

A woman. Photo. — Swati Aggarwal is a postdoctoral researcher at MAX IV.

All the talks were purposefully short, and introductory in scope so that early career researchers with different expertise would be able to follow. They also covered research on different length scales, to make the programme more inclusive: going all the way from small molecules up to cells, tendons and muscle fibres.

Daniel and Swati both agree that the format seems to have worked very well. Along with their co-organisers, they had instructed the speakers to ensure that each talk had a clear take home message.

– Many participants mentioned that they learnt something new and appreciated that the speakers introduced the technique before moving onto descriptions of their own scientific study. This is nice feedback on our programming, says Swati Aggarwal, postdoctoral researcher at MAX IV.

Lots of questions were posed after each presentation. So many that they often had to be cut short!

A man. Photo. — Daniel Sarabi is a postdoctoral researcher at LINXS.

– As with our first YRI, participants seemed very comfortable with approaching the speakers. I think this has to do both with the fact that you are among your peers, and that the speakers took care to make the information accessible, says Daniel Sarabi, postdoctoral researcher at LINXS.

Career Day - an appreciated addition to the programme

New for this year, was the career day on 24th of April, which included presentations from companies such as Novo Nordisk, Bionordica AB and Truly Labs Sweden, as well as speakers from Medviso and Medcon Valley Alliance. Speakers shared their experience, and reflected on their reasoning for taking different career pathways, which was very appreciated by the participants. Each session concluded with a panel with the various speakers, generating many questions from the audience.

– As a postdoctoral researcher your position is quite precarious in the sense that a postdoc is relatively short, often only two years: then it’s on to the next job. If we can support early career researchers to learn about new opportunities and make contacts, we can help them establish a career.

Many ideas for future YRI events

Daniel and Swati are now looking forward to the next YRI, and have many ideas to take further with the organising group, which also includes Marija Dubačkić, postdoc at the Department of Chemistry, Lund University, Maria Pierantoni, researcher at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, Lund University.

– Data-proessing and data-visualization are aspects which could be nice to focus on next. As a postdoctoral researcher at MAX IV, I know how challenging it is to start analysing your results, says Swati Aggarwal.

Daniel notes that another direction to explore could be to involve students at bachelor and master’s level, to expand the target groups for the events even further.

– If we set aside a section for these students with more introductory talks, we have opportunity to grow interest in X-rays and neutrons already at an earlier career stage. That would fit very well with LINXS educational remit, and could over time increase the user base for MAX IV and ESS substantially, says Daniel Sarabi.

“For me it was a very productive event”

Hadiqa Inam was one of the participants at the YRI event. She is representing the Science Student Union (LUNA) on the LINXS board and is currently doing a masters in Biochemistry.

– The talks were very impressive, and it was great to hear about new techniques I had no prior knowledge of, especially serial protein crystallography. I was also glad to be able to ask questions directly to the speakers, and get insights into what is happening in science currently.

Another positive take away was the connections and networking notes Hadiqa. After posing a question to a speaker, she got offered the possibility of doing an internship focused on electron diffraction, a new field that is not yet so established.

– This has never happened to me before, and shows how a single event can lead on to something else. For me, being able to approach researchers in such an informal way is very helpful to build career contacts.

Hadiqa Inam also appreciated the industry talks, as she is interested in exploring opportunities with companies after her master’s.

– For me, hearing about different career paths, and how many people had transitioned between academia and industry was very inspiring for how to look at the future! There are clearly many ways to combine an academic and industry career!