Lab Rats to Unicorns

Dr. Carnahan received his BS in Biology and BS in Psychology from Indiana University, jumped into the industry, working for Eli Lilly in both the US and France, then he came back to academia as a researcher at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France. He completed his Ph.D. in Cell Biology at Vanderbilt University and his post-doc in the laboratory of Al Reynolds, Ph.D. In 2006, he was appointed as Director of the Vanderbilt Antibody and Protein Resource (VAPR). In addition to directing the VAPR, Dr. Carnahan is an Associate Professor in the Cancer Biology, Faculty director of the Management and Entrepreneurship for Scientists program, a member of the Medical School admissions IAC committee, and is a faculty instructor for both M.D. and Ph.D. training programs.  In 2010 he co-founded the Antibody-Technologies Research Group.

dr. meesha dogan's commitment to entrepreneurship is genuinely, like actually unparalleled & laudable!!! dogan received both a joint bachelor's and master's in chemical engineering and a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from the University of Iowa. upon leaving Iowa in 2017,,, Dogan co-founded Cardio Diagnostics, where she now acts as CEO and co-founder. in 2021,,, FLIK named her one of their Womxn Entrepreneurs to Watch. Dogan shares with us the importance of preventative care, where the idea for her company came from, & more in this super fun episode!!!

okay… this one is honestly,,, soso exciting… like,,, dr. shana kelley is a highly driven and passionate scientist and intellectual!!! kelley received her B.S from Seton Hall University and promptly pursued her graduate and doctoral studies at the California Insitute of Technology!!! kelley's work in academia is outstanding and noteworthy; she has been a professor at the University of Toronto for sixteen years and is the Neena B. Schwartz Professor of Chemistry and Biomedical Engineering at Northwestern University. additionally, she is a founder of two companies, Arma Biosciences and CTRL Therapeutics, and sits on the board of numerous biotechnology companies. (wow!!!) in this episode,,, we are honored to listen to Kelley discuss her companies,,, her new position at Northwestern, the life sciences ecosystem, and sm more!!!

this is a super fun one!!! this week’s episode features Dr. Jim Audia,,, a deeply intelligent & passionate scientist! after receiving his bachelor’s & Ph.D in chemistry from the University of South Carolina, Audia did his postdoc at Yale University!!! he has flourished throughout his decades-long professional career, notably working at Eli Lilly & Constellation Pharmaceuticals for ten years each. audia also consults for a number of biotech companies,,, such as Ribon Therapeutics & Karuna Therapeutics! he sits on numerous scientific & philanthropic boards & was the former executive director of the Chicago Biomedical Consortium!!! we are so excited to have Dr. Audia discuss his work in medicinal chemistry this week, a subject he has undoubtedly dedicated himself and his life to!

e.022: you’re in for,,, a treat! Swamy Vijayan is a creator at heart. he’s run three companies as founder & ceo,,, and has deep experience in bringing interdisciplinary technologies to the market. he received a Ph.D in physics from the University of Pennsylvania and immediately began his professional career working in optics, molecular biology, nanofabrication, and computation analysis at a slew of different genomic companies. eventually, he began managing research on novel sequencing technologies as nanobiology group leader at Illumina. his first company, Omniome, worked to simplify instrumentation around DNA sequencing. at his second, Plexium, he led the way in the rational design and discovery of monovalent protein degraders across a wide range of modalities. in this episode, Dr. Vijayan discusses his third & current venture – Zafrens, polymer science, dna sequencing, and more.

e.020...omg...don't even get us STARTED! We are here to learn about Dr. Garry Cooper – the Co-founder and CEO of Rheaply, a Chicago-based tech company that enables Fortune 500 companies, government agencies, cities, and universities to enter the circular economy through reuse. He also serves on the boards of directors of P33 Chicago and 1871, and the investor team at LongJump Ventures, of which he is a founding partner. Previously, Dr. Cooper served on the faculty of Northwestern University and facilitated supply chain and performance improvement for enterprise businesses at Ernst & Young. As a result of his work, Dr. Cooper has received recognition on the Forbes Next 1000, Chicago magazine’s The New Power 30, 2022 LinkedIn Top Voices in the Green Economy, and Crain’s 40 Under 40 lists. Dr. Cooper has also been recognized as a Scholar at Google for Entrepreneurs, a 2021 Emerson Collective Dial Fellow, and one of the 100 most intriguing entrepreneurs in 2021 as determined by Goldman Sachs. Dr. Cooper has published in high-impact, peer-reviewed international journals and holds a U.S. patent. He holds a PhD in neuroscience from Northwestern University, a certificate in management from the Kellogg School of Management, and a BS & BA in mathematics and chemistry from Indiana University.

e.019 follows the journey of Dr. Jim Sullivan––the co-founder and CEO of Vanqua Bio. Tune in to hear John Flavin and the Chicago Biomedical Consortium Entrepreneurial Fellows engage with Jim, aiming to learn more about the life sciences industry and the different means of entry (to various opportunities). 

Previously, Jim was the Vice President of Research at Abbvie where he was responsible for the company’s research efforts in a variety of therapeutic/disease areas including oncology, immunology, neurology, hepatitis C and cystic fibrosis. Jim has advanced more than 100 compounds into clinical development across a number of disease states and technology platforms. 

Jim is an adjunct faculty member at Northwestern University and serves on the board of several companies and foundations including Regis Technologies, Genomics Medicine Ireland, Genuity Science, MATTER Healthcare Incubator, Chicago Biotechnology Accelerator and the Pistoia Alliance. He earned his bachelor’s degree and Ph.D. in biochemistry from Trinity College Dublin and conducted post-doctoral research in neurobiology at Northwestern University.

Go Big or Go Home: John Flavin talks Texas-style life sciences with innovation leaders Tom Luby and Sarah Hein from Texas Medical Center Innovation in e.018. New developments in Houston are setting the stage for accelerated growth in the start-up ecosystem. Investments being made by member institutions such as MD Anderson, Baylor, Texas A&M, Texas, Rice and others into innovation platforms and top-tier applied researchers means: more commercialization of new drugs and devices is on the horizon. TMC is building the infrastructure and community to create the conditions to allow for rapid scaling of the ecosystem.

Tom Luby Ph.D. is the Director of Texas Medical Center (TMC) Innovation.  In this role, he oversees all of the innovation efforts of TMC focused on research, education, and commercialization of novel healthcare solutions.  Prior to this, he was the head of JLABS @ TMC in Houston, Texas. 

Tom started at Johnson & Johnson Innovation as a New Ventures Lead at the Johnson & Johnson Innovation Center in Boston. In that role, he was instrumental in fostering many deals for the Boston office, which included the expansion of JLABS to JLABS @ Toronto.  Prior to J&J, Tom spent 14 years in various R&D and business development positions, most recently as Sr. Director, Research Ventures at Shire. Nine of those years were spent working in R&D and operational roles across three start-up biotech companies in the Boston area.

Tom received a Bachelor of Science in Biology from State University of New York, and a Ph.D. in Immunology from the Sackler School of Biomedical Sciences at Tufts University.

Sarah Hein, PhD, is an Entrepreneur in Residence for the Texas Medical Center’s Cancer Therapeutics Accelerator.

Previously, Sarah was cofounder and VP of Operations at Courier Therapeutics, where she helped develop a novel immune-targeted cancer immunotherapy. She was also Director of Research at Resonant Therapeutics, an antibody therapeutics platform technology company. She began at Mercury Fund as a Venture Fellow directly after graduating with her PhD from Baylor College of Medicine.

Sarah earned her Bachelor’s and Master’s of Science from the University of Wyoming.

Following the voices of Michelle Hoffman, Azurii Collier, John Conrad and John Flavin, e.017 means to reach a community-based perspective, focusing on the factors that contribute to and resist change/growth in emerging life science ecosystems, especially Chicago.

Azurii Collier is the Director of Enterprise Innovation at AbbVie and the National President-Elect of Women in Bio - an organization of professionals committed to promoting careers, leadership, and entrepreneurship for all women in the life sciences. Her background in Cognitive Neuroscience has been a driving force in leading transformations towards knowledge-based ecosystems.

Michelle Hoffman is the Executive Director of The Chicago Biomedical Consortium (CBC)- and organization built to stimulate collaboration among scientists at Northwestern University, The University of Chicago, the University of Illinois Chicago and others to accelerate discovery that will transform biomedical research and improve the health of humankind. She has particular expertise in healthcare analysis, biotech industry and market analysis. Her work with both large and small, private and public companies as contributed to the impact of her industry knowledge.

John Conrad is the President & CEO at Illinois Biotechnology Innovation Organization (iBIO)-an organization dedicated to promoting, connecting and engaging the life sciences community to drive discovery, transform lives through groundbreaking research and grow the Illinois economy. John works alongside policymakers to tackle issues that affect the industry; his focus has been around establishing the Midwest as a viable place to grow a life science company.

e.016 meets Dr. Mandell - a scientist, entrepreneur, and leading expert in synthetic biology, protein engineering, artificial intelligence, and biological and medical informatics. Together with Dr. George Church, he leveraged Genomically Recoded Organisms (GROs) to produce the first proteins with stability and function dependent on non-standard amino acids. Last November Grobio closed a $25 million Series A financing led by  Leaps by Bayer and Redmile, a total investment to date of $31.2 million, to help fund the company’s scale-up of bioprocess manufacturing, preclinical validation studies and IND enabling studies.

Dr. Mandell completed his research fellowship in genetics at Harvard Medical School where he was Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow of the Life Sciences Research Foundation. He received his PhD from the University of California, San Francisco, his MSc at University of Edinburgh, and his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University.