QWEST Internships

Workforce Development

QWEST Internships

Three scientists in lab, two standing, looking at camera

Overview

Funding from the State of California under Governor Gavin Newsom supports biotech workforce development at UC Berkeley’s Bakar Labs incubator.

QWEST undergraduate interns meet with founders of Bakar Labs companies.

QB3 was founded with the mission to lay the foundations of the industries of the future. With its connection to new, fast-growing companies, QB3 is uniquely placed to help develop California’s future workforce. Recent funding from the government of California to QB3 and its sister Institutes for Science and Innovation made this possible. The funding has enabled QB3 to offer six-month internships for talented students with dynamic biotech startups.

The QB3 Workforce Education for bioScience and bioTechnology (QWEST) program places undergraduate students with tenant companies at UC Berkeley’s Bakar Labs incubator for fully paid internships. Companies gain enthusiastic talent that could develop into full-time hires post-graduation. Students learn valuable scientific skills and gain business and operational insights into the workings of early-stage companies, and can potentially parlay the internship into a career path.

The internships are six months in duration; three months during the summer break, and three months part-time during the school year. Applications are taken through the year.

Only UC Berkeley students are eligible.

Eligibility

Company hosts must be active tenants of the Bakar Labs incubator at UC Berkeley. Student interns must currently be UC Berkeley undergraduates.

Testimonials

“QWEST has been a really good introduction for me to industry-level chemistry, biosciences, and engineering. My internship has helped me develop extremely important lab skills, the other companies (and interns) have each been super cool, and Noem’s guidance this summer was invaluable. I very much look forward to continuing to work with QWEST and the Axent team!”

Shruteek Mairal

“During the internship at Catena Biosciences I learned bacterial cloning, protein purification and expression to help advance the immuno-oncology space. I also gained an understanding of reaction optimization and scaling and learned about the business side of running and growing a startup.”

Sofya Lebedeva

“Our intern, Meltem Su, joined Valitor during a period of growth for our scientific team, and was a standout every step of the way. She learned molecular cloning techniques quickly and expertly, and performed them independently. This work supported our therapeutic protein manufacturing, allowing us to develop our biopolymer-based immunotherapy products.”

Adam Barnebey, Director of Protein Science, Valitor

Interns – 2023

Erin Akins

2023

Aryaa Chanchani

2023

Samantha Chiang

2023

Jasmine Gallegoes

2023

Sarah Hoyle

2023

Zahmiria Johnson

2023

Nicole Klein

2023

Aria Kumar

2023

Claire Li

2023

Elijah Liu

2023

Kenneth Loi

2023

Phuoc Minh Quan Mai

2023

Matchamon (Nam) Pianapitham

2023

Andrew Puglise

2023

Alex Qu

2023

Rachna Saha

2023

Liz Shen

2023

Interns – 2022

Damla Aydin

2022

Hannah Chen

2022

Ethan Chieng

2022

Claire Chou

2022

Caroline Christophersen

2022

Nelson Tristram Gaillard

2022

Dexter Lai

2022

Sofya Lebedeva

2022

Shruteek Mairal

2022

Nathan Pellini

2022

Dereck Ruiz

2022

Shifa Sabaat

2022

Meltem Su

2022

QWEST Internship Application Form