Meet Laura Corral

We were lucky to catch up with Laura Corral recently and have shared our conversation below.

Laura, we’ve been so fortunate to work with so many incredible folks and one common thread we have seen is that those who have built amazing lives for themselves are also often the folks who are most generous. Where do you think your generosity comes from?

Throughout my academic and professional career I have been the recipient of excellent advice, help and mentorship from professors, supervisors and colleagues. I have tried over the years to pay that forward by mentoring and advising young people working alongside me and young interns under my supervision. I am proud to say that I have been instrumental in placing several of those mentees in good professional positions and in inspiring young high school students to pursue careers in science. I want to expand my mentorship to include more high schoolers from minorities, especially those that may not be thinking of science as a career open to them.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?

I was born in Rio de Janeiro and moved to the US to attend graduate school. I studied biology at NYU and started my professional career working with chocolate of all things, trying to optimize cacao fermentation to improve chocolate flavor. That was a very interesting experience that allowed me to visit Ghana to learn more about cacao processing. A few years later however I decided to move to the biotechnology field and got a job at a biotech starter where I worked for more than 20 years, first in NYC and then in San Diego. Over those years I saw that small biotech grow into a large and very successful pharmaceutical company. I then decided to move to another start up as I missed the atmosphere of a small company of like-minded people striving to create something novel. I take satisfaction in having helped in the creation of drugs that treat cancer and inflammation. I continue to find purpose and excitement in trying to develop new drugs for conditions that are still difficult to treat, including childhood sarcoma. In my spare time I love watching theatrical plays and when possible to be on stage. I have been lucky to be cast in some community theater productions in San Diego and that has been a very new and exciting experience for me.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

Openness to new experiences, a good and positive attitude, no fear of asking for help. These in my view are the most important qualities to achieve success in any field. Any skill can be learned if you have openness, a good attitude and know how to ask for help without fear or embarrassment. One way to develop those skills may be to try something, related to your field or not, that you find challenging and see how well you can approach it. Be curious, ask questions from people around you who are involved in different things. There are no wrong questions, it is always better to show interest in something than being quiet and seem uninterested. Also keep in mind that frequently your goals will change during your career and you may end up in a very different field from where you started. Keeping an open mind and attitude will serve you to find opportunities and move into positions that may suit you better and bring you more excitement and satisfaction.

What is the number one obstacle or challenge you are currently facing and what are you doing to try to resolve or overcome this challenge?

Our main challenge at the moment is to attract partners to help us fund our clinical trials. We are addressing this challenge by applying for grants for small business by the National Institute of Health and other governmental funding institutes, identifying good academic research partners and participating in meetings with potential investors. This is a challenge that all small companies struggle with. It takes significant time and energy to obtain the funds necessary to do our research.

Contact Info:

• Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/laura-g-corral-0b163211
• Other: lgcorral@novomedix.com