Part II: Adventures in Molecular Recognition

In the movie "Moana" the lead character sings the refrain, "There's no telling how far I'll go" before she heads off on the adventure of a lifetime. In this short talk, I will give a personal reflection of my own adventures in science, which started with telling my freshman advisor that I aspired to have a work-study position in a research lab. I was subsequently selected as part of the inaugural class of Beckman Scholars, and most recently, things have come full circle as I became co-Director of the Beckman Scholar Program at the University of Utah, where I am an associate professor of chemistry. My research has spanned the fields of chemical biology, synthetic biology, and microbiology, involved collaborations across the globe, and last year I led an experiment conducted on the International Space Station. In other words, I want to convey to current Beckman Scholars that an academic career is a "Choose Your Own Adventure" type of career, and there is no telling how far they will go!