Dr. Brandon Garcia, winner of the Outstanding Dissertation award, is an alumnus of the IPhD program in Cell Biology & Biophysics and Molecular Biology & Biochemistry. He is now working with Dr. Magnus Hook in a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Texas A&M Health Science Center in Houston, Texas.
Brandon earned his bachelor’s degree in biology from UMKC, and worked his senior year in Dr. Brian Geisbrecht’s lab.
“Although I looked outside of the area for graduate schools, I had become very interested in the projects in Dr. Geisbrecht’s lab,” he said. “After my wife was accepted to the UMKC Pharm.D. program, it was an easy decision for me to enter the IPhD program at UMKC.”
Initially, Brian wanted to pursue a career in pharmacy, but soon found he was fascinated by molecular biology.
“I was amazed that the molecular details of complicated biological processes could be studied with equally fascinating technologies,” he said. “I was also surprised about how little was known about many of these fundamental biological processes. I was excited to have a career where I could make new discoveries, and a Ph.D. in molecular biology seemed to offer an endless number of interesting questions to investigate.”
Brandon’s first two years in the IPhD program were challenging. He was learning how to work in the lab, working as a teaching assistant for undergraduate microbiology courses, taking his required courses, and preparing for comprehensive exams.
“Fortunately, I was able to obtain exciting data for a number of key experiments during this time,” he said. “This provided a foundation for my dissertation research and allowed me to have a fun and productive final two years in the program.”
Although he remembers many stressful times, Brandon said he enjoyed all aspects of his four years in the program.
“The people I worked with and met, and the projects I worked on made it an incredibly fun time in life,” he said.
During his Postdoctoral Fellowship, Brandon will work to establish himself as an independent scientist and continue his work in understanding host-pathogen interactions. His IPhD degree will help him to continue with a career in academia.
“My goal is to obtain a tenure-track faculty position at a quality academic institution where I can establish my own research program,” he said.
Brandon shared some advice for current and future graduate students.
“Seek out independent funding opportunities, even if it is not strictly required,” he said. “The grant writing experience alone is worth participation for anyone who wants to work in academic fields where competitive grant-writing is a critical component to career success.”
He also encourages students to take advantage of the Travel Grant program, which helps to fund presentations for students at conferences and symposiums around the country and the world. Brandon was able to attend and present at several scientific conferences during his IPhD work, including an international conference in Greece where he met many leading experts in his field.
“These experiences broadened my scientific perspective and gave me many new ideas for my own work,” he said. “These meetings are also a great place to begin collaborations with scientific experts in related fields. Given the current funding climate, these types of collaborations are often critical for writing competitive research proposals.”