PEOPLE INTERVIEWED

Dr. Snyder has initiated the Big Data approach to healthcare through his work using omics to detect early-stage disease, including wearables to detect infectious diseases like COVID-19, and at-home microsampling to measure hundreds of molecules from a single drop of blood. He is the first researcher to gather petabytes of data on individuals, which is 1 million to 1 trillion times more data than the average clinician collects. He has published over 800 papers and is one of the most cited scientists. In terms of commercial success, Mike has co-founded 17 companies (including 2 unicorns) with a combined enterprise value of over $6 billion.

Genetic Alliance delivers impactful programs, products, and tools designed to recognize the power of people in alleviating suffering. As ‘just a Mom’ with a master’s degree in Theology, she cofounded PXE International, a research advocacy organization for the genetic condition pseudoxanthoma elasticum (PXE), in response to the diagnosis of PXE in her two children in 1994. This research advocacy entity champions efforts to find a treatment for PXE. Her remarkable scientific contributions include co-discovering the ABCC6 gene, pioneering a diagnostic test, and leading clinical trials. Sharon is an esteemed author with 150 peer-reviewed publications, including 30 pivotal clinical studies on PXE. Her inspiring journey is described in her TED Talk and TED Radio Hour.

With her gaze fixed on enhancing consumer participation in genetics, Sharon holds influential positions across several preeminent international and national bodies. These include the Precision Medicine Initiative Cohort Advisory Panel, Accelerating Medicines Partnership, National Academy of Medicine's Roundtable on Genomics and Precision Health, NAM Board on Health Sciences Policy chair, and many more. As a founding figure, she's left her mark on organizations like the EspeRare Foundation and the International Rare Disease Research Consortium. Sharon's advocacy led to the landmark passage of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act. Her accolades include an honorary doctorate from Iona College in 2006, the Research!America Distinguished Organization Advocacy Award in 2011, and the Clinical Research Forum's Leadership in Public Advocacy Award. FDA acknowledged her as one of the "30 Heroes for the Thirtieth Anniversary of the Orphan Drug Act" in 2013. She's also a co-inventor of PEER, backed by a significant grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

As a beacon of participatory health, Sharon was honored with the Luminary Award from the Precision Medicine World Conference in 2019 and is celebrated as an Ashoka Fellow since 2009. She received the American Society of Human Genetics Advocacy Award in 2021. Terry is an Ashoka Fellow. She is an avid student and facilitator of Gestalt Awareness Practice, offering workshops and individual facilitation. Her daughter and son are why she started down this path. They, their wives, and her granddaughter ground and enliven her.

In 2016, ISB affiliated with Providence St. Joseph Health (PSJH) and Dr. Hood became PSJH’s Senior Vice President and Chief Science Officer. He is also Chief Strategy Officer and Professor at ISB. In September 2023, Dr. Hood joined the Buck Institute for Research on Aging as Chief Innovation Officer and Distinguished Professor and co-directing the Center for Phenomic Health.

Dr. Hood is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the National Academy of Medicine. Of the more than 6,000 scientists worldwide who belong to one or more of these academies, Dr. Hood is one of only 20 people elected to all three.

He received his M.D. from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and his PhD in biochemistry from Caltech. Dr. Hood was a faculty member at Caltech from 1967-1992, serving for 10 years as the Chair of Biology. During this period, he and his colleagues developed four sequencer and synthesizer instruments that paved the way for the Human Genome Project’s successful mapping and understanding of the human genome. He and his students also deciphered many of the complex mechanisms of antibody diversification. In 1992, Dr. Hood founded and chaired the Department of Molecular Biotechnology at the University of Washington, the first academic department devoted to cross-disciplinary biology.

Dr. Hood has co-founded 17 biotech companies including Amgen, Applied Biosystems, Rosetta, and Arivale. His many national and international awards include the Lasker Prize, the Kyoto Prize, and the National Medal of Science. Currently, he is the CEO of Phenome Health and Co-Founder and Professor at the Institute of Systems Biology in Seattle.

Among his achievements, Dr. Kingsmore holds the Guinness World Record for achieving the fastest molecular diagnosis using whole genome sequencing in just 19.5 hours.

Before being selected to lead RCIGM, he was the Dee Lyons/Missouri Endowed Chair in Genomic Medicine at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine and Director of the Center for Pediatric Genomic Medicine at Children's Mercy Hospital, Kansas City. Dr. Kingsmore received MB ChB BAO BSc and DSc degrees from the Queen's University of Belfast. He trained in clinical immunology in Northern Ireland and did a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in rheumatology at Duke University Medical Center.

After completing her doctorate, Cande joined Solexa Inc. in 2004 as a junior scientist in the Chemistry Department. Following the company's acquisition by Illumina in 2007, she continued to ascend through the ranks, assuming diverse roles within the organization. Her contributions to sequencing chemistry, formulations, and advancements in surface chemistry and flow cells highlight her diverse expertise and innovative spirit.

In 2011, Cande made a pivotal transition to Illumina's Head Quarters, in the United States, where she spearheaded the establishment of the Materials Science team in San Diego. She expanded the department's geographic footprint and solidified her reputation in the field. Recognized for her visionary approach and transformative impact, she was subsequently appointed as VP, Global Head of Advanced Science, overseeing a global cross-disciplinary team of over 400 scientists and engineers across the US, UK, and Singapore.

Her team’s pioneering efforts have played a seminal role in revolutionizing sequencing technologies. They are instrumental in designing and launching key technologies for sequencing consumables, library preparation, assays, flow cells, and in advancing the capabilities of Illumina's sequencing platforms. Notably, Cande’s contributions have earned her Illumina’s prestigious Innovations Award on two occasions, reinforcing her legacy within the company.

Cande actively engages with the illumina community as part of Employee Resource groups, having previously served as an executive sponsor for SHADES and iLatinx, and supporting projects with the Women at Illumina Network. Her dedication to driving positive change extends beyond the laboratory, embodying a holistic approach to scientific leadership and social responsibility.

At Leica Microsystems, Prachi leads the sales and customer-facing technical teams for North America. Prachi and her team work closely with researchers who are dedicated to examining and understanding cells, the basis of all life, and working toward the next steps in treatments and progressing human health.

Prachi’s career has included a variety of commercial and operational roles. She has had the privilege to work with researchers across the entire life sciences community.

In the 1990s, Prachi was a bench scientist working on gene therapy when it was an idea only the most intrepid were investing in. She is thrilled to see some true patient benefit in recent years. She is especially optimistic about the promise of immunotherapies, including CAR-T therapies, to move cancer treatment forward.

Prior to joining Leica, James was with Tecan where he held a variety of positions including VP of Life Science and Applied Markets. James has worked in academic and biopharma research, diagnostic and applied markets throughout his career.

His education background is in biology with his career beginning at Johns Hopkins University in genomic research. He holds an MBA from Kenan-Flagler Business School and the OneMBA program.

With a broad knowledge of life science applications and a keen understanding of business strategy, Dr. Noah has successfully expanded BioIVT's portfolio and increased brand awareness. Previously, Dr. Noah served as BioIVT's head of marketing and director of research and development for the cell and gene therapy business unit. She was also a senior marketing manager for Enzo Life Sciences and a senior scientist at Pall Corporation. Dr. Noah received her PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Stony Brook University, and her BS is in Food Science from Cornell University.

His lab is composed of a diverse set of engineers and scientists solving health problems by using and developing systems biology tools and technologies to describe and control spatial relationships between cells in tissues. John has been recognized by a number of organizations for his work including receiving: American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellowship, NCI Postdoctoral Fellowship, Irving Cancer Immunology Awardee, ARCS Scholar, Siebel Scholar, and NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.

John and his team have been focused on the development of advanced manufacturing technologies to expand ACROBiosystems’ solution portfolio to offer unique, pioneering products and services to their customers.

John’s career prior to ACROBiosystems included a variety of different roles across technical and marketing teams in companies such as GE Healthcare Life Sciences (now Cytiva).

His roles across the industry have provided him with the unique opportunity to perceive varying perspectives from end-users to suppliers. As such, he strives to foster this perspective to deliver more innovative products with end-users in mind with ACROBiosystems.

Kate held postdoctoral positions studying leukaemia at the MRC’s National Institute for Medical Research, London and the University of Oxford before specializing in flow cytometry and moving to industry, joining Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2013. Since then, Kate has held roles in the field support organization prior to product management where she is now responsible for part of the flow analyzer instrument portfolio.

Research efforts at the DeKosky lab have developed a suite of high-throughput single-cell platforms for large-scale analyses of adaptive immunity. These studies are advancing new approaches in biologic drug discovery, and are cataloguing the vast genetic and functional diversity of adaptive immune cells across disease settings. Key application areas include infectious disease interventions, especially malaria and HIV-1 prevention, and the development of targeted cancer therapeutics.

Dr. DeKosky has been awarded several honors for his research program. His Ph.D. research was supported by a Hertz Foundation Fellowship and an NSF Graduate Fellowship. In 2016, DeKosky was awarded a K99 Pathway to Independence Award and an NIH Early Independence Award. More recently he has also received a Department of Defense Career Development Award, the James S. Huston Antibody Science Talent Award, and the Amgen Young Investigator Award.

He is a licensed and board-certified neurologist and has held academic appointments at Stanford, Yale, and Columbia prior to joining the Neurology Department at UCSF in 2004 where he was the founding director of the UCSF Broad Stem Cell Center. He was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2008.

Dr. Kriegstein studies brain development. He discovered that radial glial cells, long thought to simply guide nerve cells during migration, are neural stem cells. This concept is now one of the tenets of developmental neuroscience. He also described a second class of ‘intermediate progenitor cells’ produced by radial glia that defined a new mechanism for the generation of cell diversity. More recently he discovered ‘outer radial glial cells’ that contribute to the developmental and evolutionary expansion of human neocortex. His single-cell genomic studies have advanced our knowledge of glioblastoma, cortical malformations, and autism. He also co-founded Neurona Therapeutics, a company developing cell therapies for epilepsy.

He received postdoctoral training with Dr. Xiaowei Zhuang at Harvard University, where he co-developed methods for transcriptome-scale imaging. He started his independent laboratory at Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in 2018, where his laboratory focuses on using spatial transcriptomic methods for the characterization of the interactions between commensal microbial communities and their hosts. Dr. Moffitt is a co-founder and scientific advisor for Vizgen, and was named a 2019 Pew Biomedical Scholar.

The primary focus of the laboratory is on the development of targeted immunotherapies for the treatment of emerging infectious diseases, cancer, and aging. The lab’s bioengineering efforts are on developing cellular therapies and human antibodies for use as standalone or combination therapies. In the infectious disease arena, the lab works on developing therapies to prevent and treat influenza, COVID, and Lyme disease. Broadly neutralizing antibodies against flaviviruses are also in phase II studies to treat Dengue virus infections. In the field of cancer immunotherapy, the laboratory has developed several immunomodulatory antibodies that are expected to receive FDA approval imminently as well as dual-targeted, immune-restoring CAR T-cells for the treatment of renal cell carcinoma with an anticipated start date of phase I clinical trials in Q4 2025. Additionally, he is actively working on developing cellular therapies for ovarian and lung cancer, and the development of multispecific antibodies ranging from synergistic bispecifics to trispecific T-cell engagers. Antibody and cellular-based therapies to treat aging through the removal of senescent cells are also under development. Dr. Marasco is also an expert in developing “humanized” mice by using human PBMCs to reconstitute the human immune system and works closely with The Jackson Laboratory to test new and improved mice strains that support all cellular elements of the human immune system. This platform allows for the development of biologically relevant tumor models that can be used to evaluate novel immunotherapies.

Besides his research and teaching activities, Dr. Garcia Vallejo started in 2014 the Microscopy and Cytometry Core Facility at the Amsterdam UMC – Location VUmc. In order to future-proof his facility and to help bridging the gap of between academic science and technology exploitation, Dr. Garcia-Vallejo followed an executive MBA program of the University of Amsterdam. An amateur cook and photographer, Juan loves spending his free time with his wife, his two daughters, and his Border Collie.

During his post-doctoral fellowship at the NIH, he developed a live-cell assay to identify antigen-specific CD4+ T-cells using CD154 expression, a key step in understanding immune responses. His contributions to single-cell analysis for infectious disease and immuno-oncology include: reporting the first 18-color and 28-color flow cytometry experiments, introducing reagents (Quantum Dots, Live/Dead Fixable. and Brilliant dyes), developing hardware (BD FACS Symphony instruments), and introducing new informatic tools (SPICE, flowType, flowClean, terraFlow), greatly improving technological capabilities.

Dr. Chattopadhyay was an Associate Professor at NYU Langone, where he founded the Precision Immunology Laboratory, which contributed to clinical research and trials in cancer, infectious disease, and autoimmunity. As the Founder and CEO of Talon Biomarkers, and CSO of terraFlow Bioinformatics, Dr. Chattopadhyay focuses on biomarker discovery and immune monitoring, helping to advance research on disease pathogenesis, patient outcomes, and drug therapies. His expertise in high-parameter technologies, data analysis, and interpretation drives this work.

In addition to his research, Dr. Chattopadhyay served as an Associate Editor for Cytometry and the Journal of Immunological Methods, has been a council member of the International Society for the Advancement of Cytometry, and was the Scientific Chair for the international CYTO2019 conference. He earned his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and a B.A. from the University of Virginia.

Originally from Italy, she received a Bachelor's and Master's, both awarded cum Laude, from the University of Bologna. Dr. Soragni then secured a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the ETH of Zurich followed by a postdoc with David Eisenberg (UCLA) before starting her independent lab in December 2016.

Her lab currently focuses on two major and overlapping areas of research. First, they investigate how protein aggregation affects cancer development and progression, with a special focus on p53 aggregation. They also exploit protein aggregation as a therapeutic target by designing peptides that interfere with the process.

Second, and in parallel, the lab focuses on developing clinically relevant organoid models for cancer biology, as well as drug discovery and development applications. In particular, they establish tumor organoids from surgical specimens (patient-derived tumor organoids) and perform high-throughput drug screenings to individualize cancer therapy for each patient.

Since early adopting organoid technology in 2019, Crown Bioscience has combined proprietary expertise, strategic licenses, and cutting-edge innovations to remain at the forefront of preclinical oncology drug development.

Marrit received training in molecular cancer biology at Utrecht University (Netherlands) and has held postdoctoral positions at MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology (Cambridge, UK) and the Hubrecht Institute (Utrecht, NL). Her work has focused on tumor stem cell biology and drug sensitivity, including hands-on development of organoid technologies in the lab of Prof. Dr. Hans Clevers. In 2020, she joined Crown Bioscience to establish and lead an innovation lab in the Netherlands dedicated to organoid research. She now oversees global in vitro R&D efforts and spearheads collaborations with academic and industry partners worldwide.