I am a Staff Scientist in the laboratory of Cellular Oncology. My research focuses on T cell immune responses in the context of viral infections and cancer development related to human papillomavirus. I also work on the development of cancer therapies and vaccines that could be deployed in low resource settings. I did my postdoc in Dr John Schiller laboratory and was recruited after my postdoc together with an increasing number of Staff Scientists across NCI. I am glad to see that the role of Staff Scientists and Staff Clinicians is becoming more appreciated as instrumental for the success of academic research. In fact, NIH has been leading the way in that aspect and the importance of more permanent scientist positions in academic labs was advocated by prominent scientists such as Bruce Alberts, Marc W. Kirschner, Shirley Tilghman and Harold Varmus in this position article published in PNAS a little less than decade ago (https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1404402111). 

During my tenure as a Staff Scientist, I have been part of the annual scientific retreat subcommittee and the professional development subcommittee. My active participation in these 2 subcommittees was manifested in the successful organization of the 2023 professional development day and the last five  annual SS/SC scientific retreats as organizer and as co-chair in 2020. With this experience, I believe that I have acquired a solid understanding of the organization and understand better the aspiration of the diverse Staff Scientist and Staff Clinicians community. 

As co-chair at the executive board, I will primarily focus on strengthening scientific animation through the existing platforms such as the scientific retreat and the brown bag seminar series. I will engage in collaboration and continuing education for Staff Scientists and Staff Clinicians. I believe that these three aspects could contribute to strengthening the position of staff scientist and Staff Clinician to achieve our professional goals and to serve the institution better. Finally, and maybe most important I will serve as a liaison between us and the NCI leadership. I am always reachable and I will be happy to relay your concerns, suggestions, or ideas.

I firmly believe that these efforts will not only strengthen the position of Staff Scientists and Staff Clinicians but also contribute to the overall success of our institution. I am committed to serving with dedication and passion, working collaboratively with fellow professionals to achieve our common goals

I am Ravi Chalamalasetty, a Staff Scientist in the Cancer and Developmental Biology Laboratory, CCR, NCI-Frederick campus. I have been a SS from 2015 and since then, I have attended and presented my work at many annual SS/SC retreats including at virtual meeting in 2021. These meetings were super informative not only learning about fellow SS/SC’s exciting work but also provided much needed information about Quad Reviews and other professional development initiatives by the SS/SC committee members. I recently attended SS/SC Professional development day in Oct 2023 and learned about exciting opportunities to develop professionally. When I learned about the open position for Frederick co-chair position from my website committee Chair, I was excited to apply for the leadership opportunity to contribute and serve the SS/SC community. For many years, I was part of SS/SC Website Committee helping in the maintenance of SSSC website. Specifically, I played a key role in organizing and updating Peer-to-Peer Mentoring Program (PPMP) webpage. Additionally, I also served on the SS/SC Retreat committee, working within the Agenda Team to draft invitation letters for distinguished speakers.

If elected as co-chair, I am enthusiastically looking forward to collaborating with other Board members to further enhance the visibility of the SS/SC organization and educate fellow staff scientists about the available resources, fostering new connections, facilitating new collaborations, thereby collectively advancing the success of our community.

I joined NCI in 2005 as a post-doctoral fellow and transitioned to Staff Scientist and head of the CCR Mass Spectrometry Resource in 2012. In this role, I have had the opportunity to collaborate with many Staff Scientists across CCR, learning about their important scientific work and supporting it with mass spectrometry methodologies.

After several years as an attendee of SS/SC events, I joined the editorial team of The Dossier, where I am responsible for The Core Corner. This role perfectly combines my connections with core facilities within CCR and the SS/SC community. In this section, I aim to inform SS/SC members about available resources to further their research.

As an SS/SC co-chair, I look forward to continuing to support the needs of SS/SC from a different perspective. I believe that collaboration and communication are critical to our success, and I hope to facilitate both to help us all achieve our goals.

I am a Senior Associate Scientist within the Bioorganic Chemistry Section of the Chemical Biology Laboratory, CCR, NCI. I joined the NCI laboratory of Dr. Terrence R. Burke, Jr. with a NIH post-doctoral Visiting Fellowship in 2005. Since then, I have been sequentially promoted to Research Fellow (2008), Staff Scientist (2010), Associate Scientist (2019) and Senior Associate Scientist (2023). My research focuses on developing target-directed small molecules and peptides including HIV-1 integrase strand transfer inhibitors (INSTIs), polo-like kinase 1 polo-box domain (Plk1 PBD) binding peptides, and tyrosyl-DNA phosphodiesterase 1 (TDP1) inhibitors. I was awarded the first CCR SSSC Research Award (2019). I have taken the SSSC Career Enrichment Program (SCEP, 2020) and the CCR WSA SSSC Leadership and Visioning Program (2023-2024). I have served as a member of the SSSC Professional Development Committee since 2017. I have also served as a mentor in the CCR SSSC Peer-to-Peer Mentoring Program (PPMP) since 2023. I’m impressed and encouraged by the work that have been done by current SSSC co-chairs and committee, related to optimizing the letter of agreement between SS/SC and PIs, removing the cap of the AS and SAS, and navigating displacement of SSSC and so on. It will be my great pleasure to learn from them and continue serving our SSSC committee for SSSC welfare.