Samridhi Garg, an IPiB graduate student, will be defending her Ph.D. research on June 10, 2025. Her research in the Senes Lab sought to identify relationships between the structure and functions of proteins that play a key role in bacterial cell division.
Cell division is an essential process for bacterial growth and reproduction, making it a promising target for therapeutic treatments. Garg studied FtsQLB, a protein complex that regulates enzymes responsible for forming the dividing cell wall between the original parent cell and a new daughter cells during cell division. FtsQLB sometimes oligomerizes — a process by which a molecule joins together with other like-molecules. Garg characterized the oligomerization state of the FtsQLB complex and demonstrated that disrupting this process inhibits cell division.
During graduate school, Garg found within herself a talent for pivoting, staying flexible, and persevering in the face of uncertainty. For the first three years of her research, Garg was attempting to confirm the structure FtsQLB using Cryo electron microscopy (cryo-EM). She was close to successfully producing images of the protein complex structure only to have researchers at another institution publish their findings first.
“I was frustrated, but I also knew I’d have to develop a new project and pivot quickly if I wanted to graduate,” recalls Garg. “PhD research is all about moving forward with no set road map. That experience kind of shifted my focus away from just doing the experiments and toward a focus on the big picture. For me, the big picture is: how can this research be applied in industry? And that’s when I started focusing on learning more about business.”
With the support of her advisor, Alessandro Senes, Garg completed the coursework for a Professional Certificate in Entrepreneurship through the Wisconsin School of Business. The program taught her new ways of thinking. “Science classes really focus on the data and systematically using data to build our understanding of something,” Garg reflects. “The business classes were more about using data for storytelling and showing the impact. I really learned the value of communicating researcher’s impact.”
Garg further explored her entrepreneurial interests as a president of UW–Madison’s WiSolve Consulting Group, where she worked collaboratively with graduate students across campus to provide research-based business recommendations for clients. She credits her work with WiSolve for helping her identify ways that the critical thinking and science communication skills that she developed as a researcher can translate beyond the bench. Garg also served as an intern on the intellectual property and licensing team at the nonprofit organization WiSys.
Garg later shared her interest in expanding the business-oriented training offered to graduate students by hosting a global healthcare-oriented case competition. Her experience organizing and implementing the competition alongside graduate students at universities across the Midwest and in partnership with pharmaceutical companies and consulting firms is published in Nature.
Time management skills were essential for Garg to pursue an education in business while completing her doctoral research. She found keeping a scheduling that included group exercise classes on campus encouraged her to stay motivated and on-task during the day so that she could work out in the evenings.
“I’m someone who can stay in the lab until nine at night and not even realize how late it’s getting. That can have a big impact on my mental health,” says Garg. “Going to scheduled classes helped me manage my time and get out of the lab. It gave me the benefits of fitness and of having a deadline for the end of the day.”
After graduating, Garg will continue to pursue a career in industry at the intersection of science and business.
To learn more about Garg’s research, attend her Ph.D. defense, “How does structure of cell division protein complex FtsOLB direct function” on Tuesday, June 10 at 10:00 a.m. CT in Room 1211 of Hector F. DeLuca Biochemical Sciences Building.
Written by Renata Solan.