Faculty Spotlight: Erin Gloag

Erin Gloag Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, Microbiology

When did you join the college?

August 2022

The best part of being faculty is …

Two parts of being a faculty that are equally enjoyable:

1) Seeing trainees develop into independent and confident scientists.

2) Developing new research ideas and questions to follow up in the lab.

The best advice I've gotten …

Work smarter not harder

How would you capture the essence of your work in a newspaper headline?

Bacterial X-men help bacteria survive during infection

My hidden talent...

Not sure. I guess it is still hidden.

A person who has inspired me...

My Microbiology Lecturer during undergrad. I was initially majoring in Pharmacology, and after taking her class swapped to a Microbiology major. Without her class and her enthusiasm while teaching I would not be were I am today.

Words of encouragement to a current veterinary college student...

It's ok to say 'I don't know' and to make mistakes. It is part of the learning process.

One misconception that all students seem to have is...

For scientific writing, you need to be verbose and use an extensive vocabulary.

Short and simple is always the best practice.

If I had a superpower, it would be...

Teleportation

This excites me the most about the future of my industry...

That technology is advancing, allowing omics analyses to be performed on a larger scale and more cost effective. This is opening new avenues of research and making these analyses more accessible.

A cause I'm most passionate about...

Making research and science more accessible.

Favorite way to end the day...

Sitting outside with a beer and my dog.

Top of my bucket list...

Hiking the Kokoda trail.

My favorite quote…

"We've had first breakfast. What about second breakfast?"

How many pets/animals live at home?

I have a dog Bouncer. He lives up to his name.