In this talk I will provide an introduction to research at the National Institutes of Health, emphasizing training opportunities and providing my perspective on paths for students and fellows interested in the path of an NIH researcher. After a Q&A, I will introduce my group's work developing chemical tools to investigate RNA acetylation, how we have applied these tools to map this modification across the tree of life, and highlight how this basic research is guiding efforts to enhance the properties of therapeutic nucleic acids.