Young Investigators reach out to Turkish scientists
EMBO Young Scientists Forum

More than 400 young Turkish scientists got together at Istanbul’s Bocaziçi University campus for the first-ever EMBO Young Scientists Forum on 20 – 22 February.

Two recipients of EMBO Installation Grants, Nesrin Özören from Bogaziçi University and Devrim Gözüaçik from Sabanci University, organized the event that attracted Masters and PhD students, post docs and group leaders from all major institutes in Turkey.

Members of EMBO Young Investigator Programme first suggested the idea to reach out to PhD students in the peripheral EMBC Member States in order to highlight the attractiveness of a life science career and to showcase European science. The local organizers developed this idea further to include scientists from all levels, allowing students to present posters and interact with the speakers, and local group leaders to present their research and network with EMBO Young Investigators. Young investigators and young Turkish group leaders gave a total of fifteen talks. A poster session with a competition for a poster prize and meet the speaker sessions completed the meeting, allowing participant interaction.

Formerly the American Robert College founded in 1863, Bogaziçi University overlooks the Bosphorous in Istanbul and is one of the top universities in Turkey with 10,500 students and nearly 1,000 faculty. All major lectures in the life sciences are given in English, making Turkish scientists attractive on the international market.

Turkish media covered the event extensively with interviews with Karim Labib (CR UK, Manchester, UK) and Anne Bertolotti (MRC LMB, Cambridge, UK) appearing in the press. EMBO Executive Director Hermann Bujard was interviewed for TV news coverage.

The dynamic community of Turkish scientists are benefiting from the increased investment into science by the Turkish government. Turkey plans to spend two percent of GDP on R&D in the near future to become an attractive scientific partner. Up until now, there has been no scheme to lure post-doctoral or young independent scientists back to Turkey after completion of their PhDs, mainly in the US. But this is changing rapidly with the government’s increasing investment in science.

Both EMBO and EMBL are supporting the Turkish endeavour to strengthen their local science base. Iain Mattaj, EMBL Director General, recently visited institutes in Istanbul and Izmir, while EMBO Young Investigators will return to Bogaziçi University for their 2009 annual meeting.

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