Biological Sciences School Alumnus, Kevin Liang, completed both his undergraduate (2001) and doctoral degree (2007) at UC Irvine before pursuing a career in healthcare innovation.  Dr. Liang was part of the first class of undergraduate Neurobiology majors at the Biological Sciences School, and subsequently earned a Ph.D. from the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior.  Since graduating from UC Irvine, Kevin has founded/co-founded three companies, including MileStone Research Organization (a boutique medical device and pharmaceutical consulting firm), Cortex LabCoats (a designer healthcare apparel company) and Ceresti Health (a technology-enabled population health company focused on dementia care).

“I pursed a career in industry and healthcare entrepreneurship after spending almost 10 years at the Biological Sciences School.  While I love what I do today, I hope that someday I can step away from my current comfort zone and make my way back to academic research and teaching. Maybe back at UCI!”

“The knowledge that I obtained while a student at the Biological Sciences School has no doubt transcended into my everyday life and career.  It wasn’t all the textbook facts that I memorized, it was the life skills that I developed while working with the students and faculty at UCI.  I can’t say enough about how much my graduate adviser, Dr. Raju Metherate, helped shape my approach to problem solving and managing challenges in my work. I still remember the day in his lab that I stopped fearing the idea of failing, as he helped me realize that in order to accomplish something truly unique and special, there will be an evitable risk of failure. I started learning so much more from my experimental setbacks than from my victories, and that put me on a path to always seek ways to be a few steps outside of my comfort zone.”

“One of the best aspects of an education at UCI are the opportunities to collaborate with world class researchers across different disciplines to answer tough scientific questions as a team.  Dr. Metherate encouraged the idea of looking beyond the capabilities of our own neurophysiology lab to search for the answers we needed. We collaborated with some of the top researchers in molecular neuroscience (Dr. Frank LaFerla), pharmacology (Dr. Francis Leslie) and learning and memory (Dr. Norman Weinberger), all without having to leave campus.”