I would love to get involved with a company like this, however I am only a software engineer with no background in the biological sciences. Is there a feasible path that does not involve going back to school for many years? I am not afraid of learning new things or doing the hard work I'd need to do, I just feel like that route would be highly inefficient. I would really like to contribute towards meaningfully extending human lifespan, don't really care about the salary.
In the short term, get the highest-paying software engineering job you can, and donate a meaningful part of your income to charitable organizations working on anti-aging research such as SENS. (Check if your employer matches charitable donations, as well.) Much more efficient and effective than rethinking your entire career just so you can add one person's worth of time to such an effort.
(That's not to say "don't work on the problem directly", and there are jobs in that effort for software engineers, but don't feel like you can't contribute unless you can directly work on the problem.)
I'm currently sponsoring a matching fund for new recurring supporters of SENS, starting in November: every new recurring donation gets matched for a year, up to $24k. See https://www.fightaging.org/fund-research/
I'm in much the same boat. I have great admiration for those who have pulled off the mid-life career switch into biotechnology. There's one of those folk at the Buck Institute working on senescent cells with Judith Campisi of UNITY, in fact, transitioned over from a former entrepreneurial business career. He quit that, went back to school, and there he is, being a scientist and advancing the state of the art: http://www.buckinstitute.org/content/kevin-perrott
But for me, the math works out such that the road of greatest efficiency is to channel money into research funding via organizations like the SENS Research Foundation that I know are going to make good use of it, and have a great track record of making good use of past donations.
There are undoubtedly other efforts that could benefit from parent's CS skills -- much more than just at this company: university labs, startups, non-profits, etc. We need more people to combine CS with other fields to make this world a better place -- not just CS for CS' sake (or fintech, apps, web, etc).
meerkats1, I assure you: The "work to donate" mantra commonly touted for charities does not apply. There are plenty of organizations looking for top CS talent, and they're willing to pay real salaries. Get out there and ask friends for introductions, send emails to biotech people in your area, etc.
I'm a grad student studying a field known as bioinformatics. Basically, we come in to do the computer work for the biologists. We are in very high demand, as most biological research today generates huge quantities of data, and most biologists don't have the skills to deal with it.
The good news for someone like you is that I've met a number of people with a lot of experience in the computer side of things but little to no biology knowledge. There are in fact a lot of projects that could benefit from a good programmer/data analyst even if they don't know much biology. A lot of bioinformaticians just pick up the biology they need to know about their project as they go. Grad school would also be another route. A lot of bioinformatics programs are catered to people lacking either the biology or computer side of things. A good student could get into one of these programs without needing to go back and do a separate undergraduate degree.
I hope that helps! It's too bad that you can't pm people through this site, or I'd have no problems answering any questions if you were interested in hearing more. That said, there are a number of friendly online communities, such as the bioinformatics subreddit.
I'm sure most labs would kill for a 'don't care about the salary' skilled software engineer. You might start out just following orders but once you're on the ground floor you'll pick up the jargon, you'll see what research is currently 'hot', and if you pay attention and stay informed you'll find yourself moving in the direction of industry expertise.
As long as you can get your foot in the door there's no requirement to go back to school.
Count me in. I dont need money, I need datasets and biologists, I can provide the engineering, data science and computing capacity. Biologists contact me!
