A brief offstage chat during SynBioBeta SF 2017 with Andrew Pelling about the pros and cons of working at the cusp of academia and industry.

The wave of synthetic biology has engulfed both academia and industry in the recent years. While participating in this booming sector is a golden opportunity in itself, is working at the intersection of the two a boon or a curse? Andrew Pelling shares his experience of balancing between these two very different worlds.

As a student, Pelling was driven by pure curiosity to a career in academia. The field of synthetic biology was expanding, but Pelling wanted to venture away from the obvious. He wondered if he could achieve similar results as others without manipulating the genetic code. Thus began his journey in the field of augmented biology. Enjoying the freedom that academic life offered, he and students tinkered in the lab attempting to create some interesting and weird things.

Soldiering on even after several failed experiments, Pelling and team finally struck gold in their path of innovation. Their successful implantation of apple cells into mouse tissues turned out to be the perfect market for the regenerative medicine industry. Persuaded by his students and a high product demand, Pelling finally ventured into industry a few years ago. The main difference between academia and industry is the goal, according to Pelling. "Taking that discovery from the bench to a product is going to kill you. I mean, it's going to require you to not sleep, to work for years, and its whole other set of problems that you are not trained for" he warns. Apart from the time and effort required for development of the product, other factors such as researching the market potential and value proposition also need to be considered. But does working in the industry kill the academic curiosity? It's a two way thing, says Pelling. On one hand, academia does provide the freedom to explore a variety of topics, but in industry, things get done much faster. In general, Pelling feels that academics who start companies don't realize in the beginning that publishing a paper and creating a product require very different skills of problem-solving. "As an academic, you have to recognize that you have to bring in the expertise, those people who are coming from an entrepreneurial space. You can't do it by yourself," he advises any academic embarking upon an industrial role.