🧬 2 Identity Crises, 1 Mission: From Broken Shoulder to Biotech Career | Nicole Paulk (Part 1/4)

🧬 The Biotech Startups Podcast is powered by Excedr—helping life science startups accelerate R&D and commercialization with founder-friendly equipment leasing. Skip the upfront costs, stay lean, and focus on breakthrough science.

As a TBSP listener, you can get exclusive perks through Excedr’s partner network—special savings, promotions, and more. Explore these offers today: https://www.excedr.com/partners.

“No one’s going to come and save you. You have to save yourself.”

In this episode of The Biotech Startups Podcast, we sit down with Nicole Paulk, founder, CEO, and president of SIREN Biotechnology, a company pioneering universal AAV immunogene therapy to fight solid tumor cancers. Nicole takes us back to her roots — a scrappy, off-the-grid upbringing in the Pacific Northwest where a lumberjack dad raised her like a son and sports were everything, until recurring shoulder injuries ended her collegiate volleyball career at 18 and triggered her first identity crisis. She walks us through the hustle that followed; swim lessons, kickboxing classes, deli shifts, and crabbing in Puget Sound just to survive, and how she stumbled into science not out of passion, but out of a need for a paycheck at a small ag school. A summer treating patients in Kenya and Tanzania convinced her that clinical medicine wasn't her path, and one offhand comment from her chemistry professor set the entire trajectory of her scientific career in motion.

If you enjoy The Biotech Startups Podcast, please consider subscribing, leaving a review, or sharing it with your friends. Thanks for listening.

Apple:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-biotech-startups-podcast/id1679591994

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2PSL162R2s0zOwU5913Zv4

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thebiotechstartupspodcast 

Website: https://www.thebiotechstartupspodcast.com/ 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolepaulk/

Website: https://sirenbiotechnology.com/

 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonchee

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/excedr/ 

Website: https://www.excedr.com

Website: https://flow.page/kyojin 

What Is AAV Gene Therapy?: https://www.askbio.com/aav-gene-therapy/

Ebola & Marburg Hemorrhagic Fever Viruses: https://www.cfsph.iastate.edu/Factsheets/pdfs/viral_hemorrhagic_fever_filovirus.pdf

AAV Capsids That Evade Neutralizing Antibodies: https://www.cgtlive.com/view/maura-aav-capsids-evade-neutralizing-antibodies

AAV as a Vector for Gene Therapy (PMC): https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5548848/

Volunteer Medical Work in Africa: https://idi.mak.ac.ug/opportunities/main/volunteer/

Western Washington University: https://www.wwu.edu

Central Washington University: https://www.cwu.edu

University of Washington: https://www.washington.edu

Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU): https://www.ohsu.edu

UCSF Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics: https://biophysics.ucsf.edu

Stanford Division of Human Gene Therapy: https://med.stanford.edu/genetherapy.html

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation: https://www.gatesfoundation.org

Timestamps: 

00:00 Intro

03:50 Nicole's Hippie Farm Kid Upbringing in the Pacific Northwest

05:36 Sports-Centered Childhood and Lessons in Competing Solo vs. as a Team

08:19 Small Town Grit: Community, Self-Reliance, and the Value of Hard Work

14:00 Choosing a College Based on What She Could Afford

15:49 Volleyball Career Ends at 18: Shoulder Injuries and an Identity Crisis

16:56 Surviving on Odd Jobs: Swim Lessons, Kickboxing, and Deli Shifts

19:29 Crabbing in Puget Sound and Transferring to an Ag School

20:45 Falling Into Science for a Paycheck, Not Passion

24:36 Dream of Becoming an Infectious Disease Doctor

26:06 The Letter-Writing Campaign to Fund a Summer in Africa

29:10 Kenya and Tanzania Change Everything: Realizing Medicine Isn't the Path

31:06 A Chemistry Professor's Offhand Comment Redirects Her Toward a PhD

32:13 Outro

The Biotech Startups Podcast gives you a front-row seat to the business and science of building a biotech. Hosted by Jon Chee, CEO of Excedr, the show features honest conversations with founders, execs, and investors about their work, their companies, and how they got there. From scientific breakthroughs to startup lessons, each episode explores what it really takes to grow a life science company—from pre-seed to IPO.