Lots of young graduates and students come to a crossroads where they need to decide which way to choose for their career. However, not everything is clear at this point and one needs to take the opportunity presented and make the best of this choice. In this Scikonnect podcast by Biopatrika our guest Dr. Jitendra Pant, Application Scientist at C> at CARON and TEDX speaker talks about how he followed the calling of life to become a Biomedical engineer. He further discusses with our hosts Srinath and Ramya about the broad spectrum of biomedical engineering and how it translates science into medical products with application in day-to-day life. He beautifully discusses the future of this field and the products that would bring revolution. Tune in to this podcast to get inspired and to follow your career with passion, hard work and focus.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhtyW8XpFm0
Transcript
Srinath:
Welcome everyone. We are Biopatrika, your own online science communication forum, bringing science closer to you in so many ways. In our Scikonnect by Biopatrika series, we talk to some of the current and future leaders from the world of science to gain some insights into their career choices. Today we have the pleasure of talking to Dr. Jitendra Pant, a dynamic individual who truly defines what it means to be a scientist in the 21st century. I’m Srinath Krishnamurthy and along with me, Ramya Chittoory, will be hosts today as we take you through this fascinating journey- that is the life of Dr. Jitendra Pant.
Ramya:
Dr. Jitendra is a biomedical engineer and he obtained his doctoral degree from University of Georgia. He was also a director and co-founder of Innovator, a biomedical startup. He has a research experience of 15 years. He worked as a scientist at Biocon and a postdoctoral fellow at University of Michigan and also a principal investigator with a number of patents. Currently, he’s an application scientist at Caron Products in the cell and gene therapy space, a field with immense potential to impact the life of billions. Jitendra is also a science communicator, having given TedX talks along with other presenters. Jitendra has elegantly transversed both the academic and industrial world, making various impacts and almost all domains of modern scientific career. It’s a pleasure meeting you, Jitendra, and having you with us.
Jitendra:
Thank you, Ramya. Thank you, Sri.
Ramya:
To kicking things off, let me start. Can you tell us about your background, educational background, and how you made it into the biomedical field?
Jitendra:
Yeah, absolutely. So it was in 2004. I had just passed my 10th grade and I happened to be the topper of my school and I was confused between choosing biology and mathematics like most of us, because that kind of determines where your life will go from there. And in that confusion, I have almost made my mind to pick up mathematics over biology. Until my biology teacher, she gifted me a biology book and that was then and there I decided that I would want to make a career in biology.
She showed a lot of faith and trust in my abilities and I said let me pursue both. But I would be primarily focusing on biology. And that’s when I chose this route after making failed attempts to become a doctor. I started B tech in Biotechnology at Xia University. The herodon got to meet wonderful mentors and teachers who prepared me well and it so happened that so I joined the program in 2006, graduated in 2010, and in 2010 I became fortunate to get my first job at Biocon, where I worked for three more years and in those three years I became part of four monoclonal antibodies project. Two of them got FDA approved and after Biocon I did my Masters from BITS Pilani, Hyderabad Campus and at BITS, I came to know about this professor called Dr. Hitesh Handa, who was setting up his new lab at University of Georgia. And he was looking for students who can help him set up cell culture and microbiology space to set up a tissue engineering lab. So I had never done tissue engineering, but I had done cell culture, and I thought there is something that I can contribute. So I happened to become his first two PhD students, and it was under his leadership that I learned how to not only do research but also mentor how to nurture talents. And in doing so, I published several papers, five certain patents. I wrote a lot of grants with him, and ultimately, in 2018, when I was graduating, he asked me if I would like to be a cofounder with him, the company that he was founding, and that’s how we started a biomedical company together that received funding from NIS and CDC. And yeah, I owe a lot to the mentors that I met from time to time, starting with Ms. Madhu Sharma, who was my high school biology teacher.
Ramya:
Great! Thinking back, even I was there at a point, where should I choose the science or mathematics?
Jitendra:
Yes.
Ramya:
I wish everybody will go through there from any of the state board exams. And do you have any tips which help you in going through this journey, if possible? Can you share with our listeners?
Jitendra:
Yeah. I think regardless of whatever you choose to do in your life, regardless of the career path that you choose, if you are passionate about what you are doing and even more important, if you are passionate about making sense out of your life and by that, I mean not only being helpful to yourself, but also to the society that you live in, you cannot go wrong. It does not matter what career path you choose, especially in today’s society, where the word has become so closely knitted. There’s scope for anything and everything. So just believe in what you are doing, love what you do and do what you love, and things will fall in place for you.
Ramya:
Wonderful. Being a PhD student, I want to know personally, can you share any… some kind of recipe for PhD students?
Jitendra:
Recipe … like I told, I stumbled upon biomedical engineering because here’s something. If I tell you that I chose biomedical engineering because I always wanted to become a biomedical engineer, it would be a lie. The truth is that between 2011 and 2015, I applied to more than 200 universities via email and physical application. I was not accepted anywhere. I was so desperate that I would have taken any offer. I am fortunate that I stumbled upon biomedical engineering, but I know that at that time somebody from forest science would have approached me, I would have taken that path. I just so desperately wanted to do PhD that everything was good for me. And I did not know any better. There was nobody to mentor me, nobody to guide me. But I feel very fortunate that I did my PhD from where I did it and the mentors that I made in the process. If I have to give you a recipe, I think the recipe is, make the best out of every situation. Life outside you is a poker game. There are situations outside your control, but life inside you is a chess where you have fixed set of instruments and faculty is given to you. If you make a choice wisely, you would do good in life and the faculties and choices that you have within basically your body, your mind and your hormones. The way I lead my life is I put them in the order of my mind, body and then hormones. But unfortunately, most of the world is directed by their moods, which is dictated by the hormones. I guess if we can put them in right order where we decide what happens to us and we do not become a slave of our circumstances. Regardless, again, regardless of whether you do a PhD or not, do a PhD in the field you are in, you will do good because you are taking charge of your control and you are playing chess the way it should be.
Ramya:
Thank you.
Credits
Hosts: Srinath Krishnamurthy, Ramya
Editing: Samriti Sharma, Nikhil Tulsian, Virender Singh, Salma, Disha, Albertha Joseph
Social: Charu Gupta, Albertha Joseph-Alexander, Salma
Music by Aditya Sutar