Administrative Staff

The MBI Administration was formed upon the establishment of the Mechanobiology Institute, starting with a skeleton crew of 3 staff and has since grown  to a team strength of 12 members to date. Together with the MBI core facility teams, the MBI administration runs the day to day operations of the Institute ranging from personnel and finance matters, to the MBI graduate programme and organizing conferences.

The administration team comprises a group of young and dynamic staff dedicated to the set-up, growth and development of the MBI.  The team is headed by Administrative Director, Cynthia Lee and consists of the following sections:

Personnel

The HR team of Tan Bee Lay and Vyvian Hoe looks after all MBI colleagues, appointed at various levels. Their mission is to help MBI recruit the best talent and to provide a smooth transition of new recruits into their positions at MBI, with the aim of providing an opportunity for their career development. The growth of the Institute into a world class center of talent and resources hinges on its staff and as such every effort is made to nurture a conducive work environment.

The MBI is made up of a largely international community, with colleagues hailing from a total of 17 countries.  Recruitment is conducted locally and internationally and acceptance is based on merit, experience and job fit. MBI works in partnership with its entire staff to build a world class centre for talent and knowledge resources.

Career opportunities are advertised on the MBI  website at mbi.nus.edu.sg/opportunities, in the local press and in international scientific journals, such as SCIENCE and NATURE.

Finance

The Finance team headed by Finance Manager, Tan Cheong Hwai and comprising Shamshiya Hussein and Faith Li, manages the Institute’s budget, its expenditure and reporting.  The MBI is funded by a 10-year Institute grant which has enabled the institute to be fitted with state-of-the-art instruments and to finance all its research projects and research staff.

MBI is a semi-autonomous Research Institute within NUS. The finance team therefore also works closely with the University’s Finance Office and the University’s auditors, as well as the external auditors engaged by the Institute.

Procurement officer, Shamshiya is in charge of all purchases for the Institute and Finance officer, Faith looks after payments, claims and the regular administration and reporting of the Institute’s expenditure.

Graduate Studies

The MBI offers its own graduate programme and its academic section is staffed by officers, Chua  Ai Leng and Kho Sue Ping.  The graduate administrators implement polices related to the graduate programme in MBI. Day to day operations include looking after graduate students from the point of recruitment, application, registration, immigration, scholarship, candidature, research, academic matters and finally, graduation.

The MBI’s 5-year graduate programme in Mechanobiology is supported by generous scholarships and offers quality teaching and cutting edge research experience.  Trained by an internationally renowned team of top scientists and academics, the graduate programme attracts international and local students. The MBI graduate programme is actively promoted globally through the website, international roadshows and international conferences and conventions.  For more details about the MBI graduate programme please visit mbi.nus.edu.sg/education/.

Internship Programme

MBI’s endeavours to recruit and promote Mechanobiology amongst international students and hosts a select number of interns each year. The Internship administration team comprises Caroline Wang, Siti Haryanti and Kho Sue Ping. This hybrid team of administrators from Public Relations and Graduate Studies reflects the flavour of scholastic endeavors in our internship programme, as well as the outreach element.

We invite and support students who are interested in internships of 3 – 6 months to Singapore. The administration team takes care of invitations, visas, the administration of modest stipends and introduces the interns to meaningful research training programmes in the laboratories of their chosen MBI supervisors.

Read more about the MBI internship programme at mbi.nus.edu.sg/education/. 

Outreach and Events

Siti Haryanti and Caroline Wang form the Public Relations arm of MBI which  handles outreach and events. Siti looks after all visitors to the Institute, including both academic and student groups. Every year MBI regularly entertains group visits from overseas institutes and organizations. In 2011 alone, the Institute invited 36 seminar speakers and 31 visiting professors.

Siti and Caroline provide support and help with travel, hotels and furthermore specifically tailor the visit programme for each visitor to MBI to optimize their time at the Institute. A successful visit very often results in new partnerships in research endeavours and enhancement of the academic programme. It also expands the scientific network of the Institute, enabling it to reach out globally.

This team also forms the secretariat of all scientific conferences and workshops organized by MBI both within and outside Singapore.

For upcoming events, please visit the MBI events page.

 Research

The MBI’s research team consists of Srivani Sistla and Yvonne Tan. Srivani is the Institute’s research manager and looks after the management of the research needs of the Institute, ranging from grant calls, research funding and management, conferences, reviews and reporting. She works closely with the core facility managers at MBI to ensure the availability of facility resources to each of MBI’s research groups.  Yvonne administers and manages the fund allocation and utilization of research grants from MBI to each of its principal investigators and tracks the progress of the projects.

Through a hybrid model of a centralized and Institute-wide open laboratory concept, together with support for independent research for each PI through project grants, MBI exercises embodies a highly integrated and cohesive research initiative. This initiative draws strength from MBIs international team of physicists, biologists, engineers, theoraticians, mathematicians and computer scientists.

Article by Cynthia Lee