Careers: The Hot Ones
When a student asks, "What areas of biology will really take off when I'm ready to find a job?" you will pull out the crystal ball and hope you are right. Here are some fields that seem to be good bets.
The pharmaceutical industry will continue to scour the graduating classes for people who can help them in drug development. They will be particularly interested in those who can work with antimicrobial agents, as we experience the increasing ability of bacteria and other parasites to resist currently available antibiotics. They will want to find people who know about animal physiology as well as molecules.
Biotechnology labs will continue to grow, branching out into areas such as large-scale genetic screening, immunology, and developmental biology. They will develop genetically altered plants to increase yield and resist herbivores. They will seek people who can work with microbes and plants that reclaim polluted land (bioremediation). Farm animals will be genetically altered for greater productivity.
Figure 5 Trends indicate substantial growth in career areas like medical research, gerontology, surgery, and the neurosciences.
On the medical front, it seems inevitable that more people will be needed in the field of gerontology as our population ages. In medical research gene therapy, transplanting animal tissues, inducing regeneration of damaged organs, and repairing ineffective immune systems are among many hot areas. Cancer research should yield cures and preventions during the next several decades.
Other areas will see growth as well. The neurosciences are already experiencing spectacular growth in knowledge and will attract many researchers in the future. To make available the huge volume of information coming from all of these fields, experts in bioinformatics (using computers to analyze complex biological data) may become highly prized. In biochemistry, a hot topic is structural biology: predicting what protein or nucleic acid structure would be necessary to accomplish a task, then producing that structure. Agricultural research above the gene level will become more important as the world faces food shortages. Epidemiologists will be needed in larger numbers as disease agents are transferred from animal populations to humans encroaching on their territory. The saving of pristine habitats such as rain forests and wetlands will provide job opportunities for ecologists, conservation biologists, and taxonomists. The task of directing such large-scale efforts and of allocating resources will be carried out by science policy analysts. Last, but far from least, the outlook for jobs in teaching at the secondary school level appears to be healthy.
Figure 4 In the future, saving our environment will be an important task for ecologists and conservation biologists.
Challenges for Biology Instructors
Where do biology educators fit in? We should continue our own education in order to teach accurately the modern view of life. At the college level, we should insist that budding physicians take ecology courses and that wildlife conservation students take cell biology. We must consider revisions of courses and curricula to include new materials and especially to help students make connections with fields outside the traditional boundaries of biology. We should take advantage of the human resources in our neighborhoods, by inviting professional biologists of all sorts onto our campuses to talk about their career tracks as well as their professional interests.
Finally, we should become aware of new information sources for careers in biology, including the rich lodes to be tapped via the Internet. Many college and university life science departments now include career information on their Web pages. For instance, on my university's Biology Department home page there is much career information available (see Further Resources).
The educator's job is perhaps the most important of all: By working diligently and welcoming new sources of information, we can prepare and guide young students in their career choices.
Further Resources
WEB Sites
"Science's Next Wave, An Electronic Network for the Next Generation of Scientists"
Books
Janovy, John Jr. 1985. On Becoming a Biologist. Harper & Row Publishers, New York.
Occupational Outlook Handbook. 1996. Bureau of Labor Statistics,
U. S. Department of Labor. (Also available on the Web: http://stats.bls.gov:80/ocohome.htm)
Statistical Abstract of the U. S. Bureau of the Census. U. S. Department of Commerce. (Also available on the Web: http://www.medaccess.com/census/census_s.htm)
