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"Postdoc work in [the] academy is pretty precarious. ... I wanted something with a more sure footing but that was still technically challenging."

"Here you have to make sure you're getting things done and meeting your objectives. It's almost a completely different experience."

Biotechnology is about opportunity. And risk.

"Although many of the jobs in the RNAi industry will closely resemble positions in other industries--biochemists, molecular biologists, and pharmacologists will be in demand--some specializations will be particularly sought after."

"Working with the close-knit group of scientists is giving her exposure to many aspects of the research, and that validates part of her reasoning for coming to a start-up company like Alnylam."

"I gravitated toward the principle of minimum effort." --Ben Goertzel, chief scientific officer, BioMind LLC

"If some significant fraction of the NIH budget is going to large-scale projects, and a substantial fraction of each project's budget goes into informatics, that translates into a lot of jobs." --David States, professor of bioinformatics, University of Washington

There are molecular biologists, and biochemists, and immunologists. There are toxicologists, and pharmacologists. But there are no pharmacogenomicists.

"There isn't a pharmaceutical company that doesn't want these people. [Fellowship participants] are getting calls from headhunters 6 months or a year before they've finished." --Dave Flockhart, professor of medicine, Indiana University School of Medicine

Biotech companies are gearing up to manufacture product, but they face a shortage of talent as most young scientists interested in biotechnology have congregated to research.

"Many women don't take advantage of it because they believe that the perception is, if they do, they're not, 'real scientists.' " --Sally Shaywitz

In 2000, NSF received about 3000 computer science proposals with a success rate of 30%. In 2004, the number of applications had risen to 6500 and the success rate had dropped to 16%.

Why be normal?

"People refer to those things as their mistakes, but I think it's more accurate to say that they help to reduce choices and align the [company's] direction with the right path." --Jon Kayyem

You don't have to pay any of the money back, the government won't ask for equity in your business, and you keep full control of the intellectual property that you develop. Venture investors--if you can find any--will not be so kind.

"One famous venture capitalist looked at my business plan and said that it was an excellent treatise on solar energy, but it wasn't a business plan." --Richard Swanson

"To found a company and then stay on the outside, the company can take all sorts of different directions. If you really want to have influence, the only way to do that is to join it." - Corey Goodman

"What makes him special is his ability to judge which problems are the best to work on. Perhaps the most important skill for a researcher is being able to identify which problems you have a good chance of solving and which solutions would be most important." – John Preskill

Duties might include tracking and analyzing foreign weapons systems and capabilities; coding and maintaining weapon system simulations; C and C++ programming; keeping tabs on foreign threat capabilities against ground, naval, air, and space weapon systems; or maintaining contacts with counterparts elsewhere in the intelligence community and in government and industry.