Academic Scientist vs Industrial Scientist

Guest Speaker: Dr. Srinivas Rao, Chief Scientist,Shanta Biotech, Hyderabad, A.P.,INDIA

Date: 1^st February, 2009

Timings: 10:45 am to 12:15 pm

Participants: Principals, Faculty members and students of Veerayatan Institute of Pharmacy and Veerayatan institute of Computer Applications .

Venue:  Lecture hall

Photo 1. Dr. Rao delivering presentation.

Photo 2. Dr. Rao discussing during open question answer session.

Schedule of the Programme:

10:45 – 11:00              Prof. Dr. G. Vidyasagar, Principal, Veerayatan Institute of Pharmacy, introduced Dr. Rao and his contribution to the scientific society

11:00 to 11:45             Dr Rao’s Guest lecture via power point presentation

11:45 to 12:00             Open Discussion and Question Answer session

12:00 to 12:15             Vote of Thanks by Prof. Kamal Chakravarty, Principal, VICABA

Brief Outline of the Presentation:

The orientation of lecture was basically the comparison between the academic scientist and the industrial scientist.

Dr. Rao started with the present scenario and thinking of the scientists in both industry and academics. He suggested that Laboratory based R&D is not the only option for science/ biotechnology students. There are many more options of equally interesting and rewarding includes more than 51 fields. He projected a very interesting statement that “Who actually is a scientist? And Why we, the society need scientists?”  

A very interesting thing he shared that with the help of the ideas one can ease the projects require huge potential and man power by quoting a science fiction example of the invention by genetic manipulation of bacteria that produce an enzyme which can increase the intermolecular distance between the two cement bonds and can be utilized as bio tool for the collapse of the old buildings at very ease and cheaper than the present technology.

The invention of steam engine, invention of benzene and invention of insulin in the fields like engineering, organic chemistry and biotechnology respectively revolutionized the field and the scientific world. According to some the three major revolutions that results as products for mankind are presented here.

Then he focused on the whole process of the drug development starting from an idea to the final marketed products, including the role of scientist, entrepreneurs, investors, founding team, production, marketing and the management team and also the role of the regulatory bodies, intellectual property rights and the government in the development of the same.

The rest part of the presentation was an interesting comparison of the realities, pros and cons of the academics and the industry. He covered various points like the project direction, laboratory environments, safety, documentation, review, role of intellectual property, performance, creativity, valiancy and rewards to both the industrial and academic scientist. He presented a very interesting quote with a very beautiful graphics that  “Academic science is finding a way in forest and breaking new paths, discovering things etc. wheras Industrial science is going on set path just like highway roads and producing specific products. Though industry does not hold the same value systems as academia, science is still enjoyable in both settings. But its pursuit in industry is restricted to short-term advances that could be turned into profitable commercial goods. A new set of skills had to be learned.”

All the participants were enlightened by such an innovative presentation on entirely a different type of the topic with such a descent way.