Over the past 15 months, Julie Barnes left the pharmaceutical industry, where she had worked in drug discovery for 14 years, became a director of life sciences, and gave birth. “It means being very efficient with your time,” she says.
Her new life sciences position is at BioWisdom, a Cambridge, UK-based bioinformatics company. The company provides clients with access to databases that catalogue genomic and other life sciences information, including proteomics, SNPs, and a compound’s chemistry and distribution throughout the body.
Barnes comes from GlaxoSmithKline, where she was head of neuropharmacology research. Faced with many possible targets, she learned how crucial it is to have access to the right information in order to focus on the most promising agent.
Barnes says she took the new job in order to use her discovery experience to provide customers with all the information they need to best target new therapies. “It’s a big change for me in many ways, but actually it’s building on my experience,” she says.
— Alison McCook