Chemistry Doctoral Student to Participate in National Cancer Institute Program

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Kehinde Olubanjo has been accepted to participate in the 2023 National Cancer Institute's Graduate Student Recruiting Program, which provides doctoral candidates the opportunity to explore postdoctoral opportunities at the National Cancer Institute and determine if the institute's intramural research program is an ideal fit for their professional goals.

As part of the program, accepted applicants will network with investigators and laboratory personnel, current institute postdocs and training directors to learn more about research conducted within the intramural research program, discover the training and professional development opportunities that the National Cancer Institute offers to help postdoctoral fellows succeed in their future career paths, learn more about postdoc programs that prepare participants for careers both at and away from the bench, including regulatory research, tech transfer and cancer prevention.

The National Cancer Institute is the federal government's principal agency for cancer research and training with a team of approximately 3,500 that is a part of the National Institutes of Health, and one of 11 agencies that make up the Department of Health and Human Services.

Olubanjo will attend a two-day in-person conference May 2-3 at the NIH Bethesda campus in Maryland. During the visit, he will attend seminars to learn about the science, training and career development opportunities at NCI and NIH and network with investigators, staff and current postdocs. According to the National Cancer Institute website, one of the key benefits of applying to the graduate student program is that investigators hold the accepted applicants in high esteem, as they are competitively reviewed and selected for the program, and rely on the program to fill their open positions.

More than 50-70% of the participants receive official interviews as a direct result of the program, and students even receive job offers immediately following or during the visit. Over the last five years, 42% of GSRP participants who pursued a postdoc have completed their postdoc at the National Cancer Institute.

Olubanjo is a doctoral student in the lab of professor Julie Stenken, and the major aim of his research project is to improve the relative recovery of microdialysis for the sampling of hydrophobic drugs using a technique known as affinity enhanced microdialysis by using a novel material — the Covalent Organic Frameworks — as an affinity agent to improve relative recovery.