Career Pathways: Meet Meghna Pant, PhD, Senior Scientific Strategist at Supreme Optimization

What is your background and what brought you to Portland?

I am a biochemist by training and a science educator by passion. I completed my undergrad and Masters in Biochemistry from India, after which I moved to Ohio to pursue my PhD in Biochemistry from The Ohio State University. In my PhD, I studied the role of a skeletal muscle protein in metabolism and non-shivering thermogenesis. After I graduated, I moved to Portland to be with my husband and carve out a career path for myself.

What influenced you to pursue a degree in science? Did you have any science role models?

I grew up on a university campus in a small town in India. I was surrounded by scientists and engineers! My father had a collection of scientific books at home that I would refer to for my school projects. This was the pre-internet era (cannot even imagine that now)! As a result, I was always drawn to science. In junior high I really became interested in biology and just continued in the field.My father, a retired professor of electrical engineering, was my first science role model. All through school he helped me with my science and math courses, sometimes explaining theories that were not even part of the school curriculum. Even in college far away from home, I remember calling him up and discussing my physics lectures! He continues to inspire me to maintain my interest in sciences outside of biology.

Tell us about your current role and what led you to this position. Did you switch career paths at any point?

Currently, I am a scientific strategist for a boutique life science marketing agency- Supreme Optimization. In this role, I work with clients from across the life science industry and plan campaigns to promote their products/services to scientists. This requires a deep understanding of the scientific workflow and applications of these products/services. And, then utilizing different marketing and advertising strategies to deliver the greatest return on investment! My technical understanding of the field along with the soft skills I picked up during years of training, allowed me to transition into this role.If you had asked me 5 years back, if I would end up in marketing, I would probably have laughed. Read on to see how I ended up here.I had already decided to move out of academia before my graduation. I planned on taking a break in Portland while I networked and determined my career’s new trajectory. During the break I started a biology blog, wrote a review paper and peer-reviewed a few papers for academic journals. Planning and writing the content for my blog made me realize that I loved talking about science to laymen. To get a bit more hands-on experience in this field, I pursued a Science Education internship at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. The internship allowed me to interact with people from diverse educational backgrounds and age groups and taught me how to distill complex scientific information. At the end of my internship, I met with the co-founders of the amazing local science education start up, Yellow Scope, discussed with them my ideas and interest in developing science kits that aimed to reduce gender gap in STEM, and was offered a Science Education Consultant position!At Yellow Scope, not only did I get to work on developing science kits, I also got to experience the process and importance of marketing. I decided that I can merge my scientific training with the field of marketing, and I ended up at Supreme.As I mentioned in the beginning, I am a science educator by passion. I have spent the last few years working in that field through developing science kits, conducting hands-on science classes for OHSU and Saturday Academy, and as an adjunct faculty at the Bioscience Technology department at Portland Community College.Even as I continue to delve deeper into life science marketing, I hope to keep nurturing the educator within.

What future goals do you have for your career?

I plan to continue working in marketing in near future. I do love working on the technical side of marketing that involves researching and understanding our clients’ technologies/products. Eventually, I want to transition to the management track and maybe lead a team of strategists!

Do you have any advice for women who are pursuing careers in science?

Growing up I never realized or faced the fact that girls cannot pursue science so I didn’t really think about it much. Now, after working with Yellow Scope and volunteering for WIS, I realize how fortunate I was. My only advice to all the women out there is to find a network that supports and nurtures you.

What are some challenges you faced along the way?

I think my biggest challenge transitioning out of academia was trying to find a career path that fit in with my skill set and my training. I did not have much information about marketing and did not think of it as a career path for PhDs. If I had this knowledge during my PhD, my career path would look quite different.

What impact are you making or would like to make in your field?

I help our clients get their innovative products/services to scientists who need them but sometimes are even unaware of their existence.

What is a fun fact about you that not many people know?

I design crossword puzzles for a science education magazine (I count that as fun). Author BioKylia Ahuna is originally from Colorado and moved to Portland in 2019. She studied neuroscience in undergrad at the University of Colorado Boulder and is currently a research assistant at a pediatric neurology lab at Oregon Health and Sciences University. Kylia is also passionate about making research more accessible to the public and, as such, she is pursuing a graduate degree in Science Writing. She is excited to be a part of the Women in Science organization and looks forward to sharing stories of women in STEM fields through this blog series!