UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Two Penn State graduate students participated in an intensive six-week internship last summer thanks to a partnership between the Huck Institutes’ One Health Microbiome Center (OHMC) and QIAGEN LLC, a leading multinational provider of diagnostic and assay technologies.
Samantha Seibel, a doctoral student in the Molecular, Cellular and Integrative Biosciences intercollege graduate degree program in Erika Ganda’s lab, and Naomi Huntley, a doctoral student in biology in Emily Davenport’s lab, both took part in the internship in the summer of 2025. They traveled to QIAGEN’s research and development facility in Hilden, Germany, to receive hands-on training in new techniques and exposure to career options available in industry.
“QIAGEN and the One Health Microbiome Center have set the highest standards for graduate student training in the cutting edge of the microbiome sciences,” said OHMC Director Seth Bordenstein, professor of biology and of entomology and Huck Chair in Microbiome Sciences. “By bridging the gap between industry and academia with this summer internship opportunity, our students are superbly positioned to shape the future of biotechnology and its formative capacities to lead the way in microbiome-based solutions.”
A key feature for the students, they said, was their exposure to cutting-edge technologies, like QIAGEN’s recently developed digital polymerase chain reaction (dPCR) technique, a highly sensitive method for quantification of nucleic acids.
Seibel called dPCR the “biggest highlight” of her experience and said that "it was awesome to be allowed to not only work with the machinery but also have a team on site that understood the machinery to such an impressive degree. I was thankful for that experience and am potentially going to work on a project with that technology here at the University.”
For Huntley, the experience helped clarify her career direction, and she said she encourages other OHMC-affiliated students to seriously consider the program.
“I applied for the internship because I've really been trying to decide whether I wanted to go into academia or industry once I'm done with my Ph.D,” Huntley said. “Going to QIAGEN, I learned that industry is something that is probably at the top of my list. Even if you’re not sure about industry, it’s a valuable experience. It helps you understand what’s on the other side of product development and how these technologies work.”
Applications for the 2027 summer internship will open near the end of 2026. Potential applicants may learn more on the OHMC website or by subscribing to the center's newsletter, in which details will be announced.
“While many graduate programs emphasize research and publication, few offer structured opportunities to gain hands-on experience in commercial science or product development pipelines,” Bordenstein said. “This internship opens new avenues for career exploration by exposing trainees to the translational potential of microbiome science."