Appendix C

Biographical Sketches of Workshop Planning Committee and Speakers

PLANNING COMMITTEE

Nicholas M. Adams (Co-Chair) is senior manager of systems design and innovation at Thermo Fisher Scientific and an Adjoint Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt University. Earlier in his career, he served as a Research Professor at Vanderbilt, where he led the development of field-deployable molecular diagnostics aimed at expanding global access to critical healthcare technologies. His technical expertise bridges nucleic acid diagnostics, synthetic biology, and systems engineering, with a focus on translating fundamental science into scalable solutions. He is the inventor of Adaptive PCR, a novel method that uses mirror-image L-DNA to enable robust amplification in challenging samples and environments. At Thermo Fisher, he leads cross-functional teams developing next-generation platforms for genetic analysis. Dr. Adams has received multiple innovation and leadership awards within academia and industry and is an active contributor to national-level scientific strategy and innovation initiatives. He earned his B.S. in Biology from Utah Tech University, a Ph.D. in Chemical and Physical Biology from Vanderbilt University, and completed postdoctoral training in Biomedical Engineering at the same institution. He previously served on a National Academies consensus study committee on emerging RNA technologies.

Harshini Mukundan (Co-Chair) leads the Chemical and Biological Technologies Program at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and chairs its biomedical sciences and bioengineering department. Previously, she was Group Leader in Physical Chemistry at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Her work integrates microbiology, bioengineering, and machine learning to address biodefense and emerging biological threats. She is a senior policy advisor at the Council on Strategic Risks, lectures on biosecurity at Stanford and UC Berkeley, and serves as treasurer of the Sensor Division of the Electrochemical Society. Dr. Mukundan has published over 100 peer-reviewed papers, holds multiple patents, and is a fellow of the AAAS. She earned her Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the University of New Mexico and an M.S. in Microbiology from Barkatullah University in India.

Douglas C. Cameron is currently an advisor and board member with a major focus on industrial biotechnology. He was a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, director of biotechnology and chief scientist at Cargill, Inc., and an early-stage venture capital investor. His scientific and research experience is in metabolic engineering, synthetic biology, and fermentation technology. He is a member of the National

Academy of Engineering (NAE) and a Fellow of the Society of Industrial Microbiology. Dr. Cameron holds a B.S.E. in Biomedical Engineering from Duke University and a Ph.D. in Biochemical Engineering from M.I.T.

Philip Dawson is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry at Scripps Research in La Jolla, CA and former Dean of the Skaggs Graduate School of Chemical and Biological Sciences (2017–2024). He received an A.B. in Chemistry from Washington University and a Ph.D. from Scripps Research, followed by postdoctoral work at Caltech. He has served as President of the American Peptide Society and held leadership roles in FASEB, the American Chemical Society, and the International Peptide Society. Dawson serves on the scientific advisory board on Dextera Biosciences. He has published over 200 papers and has been honored with awards including the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship, the Vincent du Vigneaud Award, the Max Bergmann Kreis Gold Medal, and the 2025 Bruce Merrifield Award. Professor Dawson is known for pioneering chemoselective ligation methods for macromolecule synthesis and their broad application in biological research.

Diane DiEuliis is a Distinguished Research fellow at National Defense University (NDU), where she researches the impacts of emerging technologies on biodefense, biosecurity and national defense. Her expertise covers biotechnology, the U.S. bioeconomy, dual use life sciences research, neurotechnology, and behavioral, cognitive, and social issues (including ELSI). Prior to joining NDU, Dr. DiEuliis was the Deputy Director for Policy and Planning, in the Office of the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Dr. DiEuliis was the Assistant Director for Life Sciences and Behavioral and Social Sciences in the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in the Executive Office of the President across two presidencies. During her tenure at the White House, she created policy in biosecurity, synthetic biology, biotechnology, behavioral science, scientific collections, and human subjects’ research. Prior to working at OSTP, Dr. DiEuliis was a program director at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), where she managed a diverse portfolio of neuroscience research in neurodegenerative diseases. Diane has authored over 80 publications and currently serves as a member of the Board on Life Sciences.

Michael C. Jewett is a Professor of Bioengineering at Stanford University. His research group focuses on advancing synthetic biology to support health, sustainability, and education. He is the recipient of the NIH Pathway to Independence Award, the David and Lucile Packard Fellowship, the Camille-Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar Award, and was a Finalist for the Blavatnik National Awards. Dr. Jewett has co-founded SwiftScale Biologics, Stemloop, Pearl Bio, and Synolo Therapeutics, and is a Fellow of AIMBE, AAAS, and NAI. He received his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University and completed postdoctoral training at the Center for Microbial Biotechnology in Denmark and Harvard Medical School.

Markita P. Landry is an associate professor in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and Neuroscience at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research focuses on neuromodulation imaging, lipid nanoparticle-cell membrane interactions, and gene delivery in plants. She is a co-founder of Biophilia Genetics and serves on advisory boards for multiple agricultural biotechnology companies. Dr. Landry has received over 40 awards, including the Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise, the Blavatnik National Prize in Chemistry, the Guggenheim Fellowship, and fellowships from DARPA, the NSF, and the Sloan Foundation. She holds a B.S. in Chemistry and a B.A. in Physics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a Ph.D. in Chemical Physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and completed postdoctoral research at MIT.

Karl Thompson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology at Howard University and serves as University Biosafety Officer. His research focuses on microbial gene regulation, small RNAs, and RNA modifications, with applications in translational microbiology and biothreat detection. He is Principal Investigator or Co-PI on multiple NIH, NSF, and DoE grants and leads biotechnology and genomics initiatives at Howard. He has received numerous honors including Cell Mentor’s 1000 Inspiring Black Scientists in America, the 2020 Outstanding Researcher Award from Howard’s College of Medicine, and the 2025 Up and Coming Researcher of the Year. Dr. Thompson earned his B.S. in Nutritional Sciences and Ph.D. in Microbiology from Howard University, with postdoctoral training in microbial pathogenesis and anaerobic bacteriology.

WORKSHOP SPEAKERS

Romy Chakraborty is a Senior Scientist and Head of the Molecular Ecology and Biogeochemistry Department in the Earth & Environmental Sciences Area at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. As an environmental microbiologist, Romy’s research has centered around unique microbes mediating critical recalcitrant carbon and nitrogen metabolisms in diverse ecosystems. She is involved in extensive outreach and mentorship in STEM. Romy is a member of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Biological and Environmental Research Advisory Committee. Romy earned a B.S. and an M.S. from the University of Mumbai, followed by a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Alta Charo is professor emerita of law and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin and now a consultant to companies, government, and NGOs on biotechnology ethics and regulatory policy. She has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; to the American Association for the Advancement of Science; and to the National Academy of Medicine, where she co-chaired its committees on stem cell research and human genome editing. In government, Alta served as a legal or policy analyst for the (former) Congressional Office of Technology Assessment, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the FDA. She also served as a member of President Clinton’s National Bioethics Advisory Commission and President Obama’s HHS transition team. Alta earned a B.A. in biology at Harvard University in 1979 and a J.D. in law at Columbia University in 1982.

Neal Devaraj is a Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, the Murray Goodman Endowed Chair in Chemistry and Biochemistry, and Chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). A native of Southern California, he attended college at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where he performed research in the lab of Prof. Moungi Bawendi. He earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry at Stanford University in the labs of Profs. James Collman and Christopher Chidsey. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the Harvard Medical School in the lab of Prof. Ralph Weissleder, he joined UCSD. His research interests are in artificial cells, lipid membranes, and bioconjugation.

Andrew Ellington received his B.S. in Biochemistry from Michigan State University in 1981, and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Harvard in 1988. His post-doctoral work was with Dr. Jack Szostak at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he developed methods for the in vitro selection of functional nucleic acids and coined the term ‘aptamer.’ He originally received the Office of Naval Research Young Investigator, Cottrell, and Pew Scholar awards, and later was a Vannevar Bush Faculty Fellow of the DoD and a Howard Hughes Professor. Dr. Ellington’s lab works centers on the development of nucleic acid circuitry for point-of-care diagnostics, on accelerating the evolution of proteins and cells through the introduction of novel chemistries, and on machine learning methods for engineering proteins and understanding evolutionary landscapes.

Michael J. Imperiale is Arthur F. Thurnau Professor Emeritus in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Michigan. Michael received a Ph.D. in biological sciences from Columbia University and performed postdoctoral studies at The Rockefeller University before joining the faculty at Michigan. He served as associate vice president for research–research policy and compliance from 2017 to 2022. Michael’s research interests focused on the study of human polyomaviruses, with an emphasis on how persistent and acute infections are regulated by viral and host factors. He served as an editor of the Journal of Virology, PLoS Pathogens, and mBio, and was the founding editor-in-chief of mSphere from 2015-2025. In 2009, he was the recipient of the University of Michigan Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award, and in 2016 he received the Rackham Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award. He was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology in 2010 and as a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2011. Michael was an inaugural member of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity from 2005 to 2014, served on the Planetary Protection Subcommittee at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and was a member of the board of directors of the Van Andel Institute Graduate School. He previously served as the chair of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on Strategies for Identifying and Addressing Potential Biodefense Vulnerabilities Posed by Synthetic Biology, co-chair of the NASEM Committee on Assessing and Navigating Biosecurity Concerns and Benefits of Artificial Intelligence Use in the Life Sciences, and as a member of the Committee on Science, Technology, and Law.

Michael Kay is a Professor in Biochemistry and H.A. and Edna Benning Presidential Chair in the School of Medicine at the University of Utah. He is also Director of the Utah MD-PhD Program and Medical Scientist Training Program. Before coming to Utah in 2001, he trained with Harold Scheraga at Cornell University (BA in Biology and Chemistry), Robert Baldwin at Stanford University (MSTP fellow in Biochemistry), and Peter Kim at MIT (Damon Runyon Postdoctoral Fellow). His lab employs mirror-image biology for the development of antiviral and antibacterial D-peptides, as well as for applications in synthetic biology.

Neha Kamat is an Associate Professor at Northwestern University in the Biomedical Engineering Department in Evanston, Illinois. She was trained as a bioengineer with special emphasis in biophysical analysis of biological and synthetic membranes, and in the production and characterization of membrane proteins using cell-free protein expression systems. She received a B.S. in Bioengineering from Rice University, a Ph.D. in Bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University Massachusetts General Hospital. At Northwestern University, Neha’s lab’s main research interests are to understand and harness biological membranes as a biomaterial for (1) fundamental biological studies related to membrane protein folding and function and (2) translational applications in diagnostics and disease. Neha is the recipient of a Young Investigator Award from the Air Force Research Office, an NSF CAREER Award, and the American Chemical Society’s Synthetic Biology Young Innovator Award.

Purvesh Khatri is a Professor in the Institute for Immunity, Transplantation and Infection and Division of Biomedical Informatics Research in the Departments of Medicine and Biomedical Data Science at Stanford University. His research focuses on developing AI and machine learning methods for leveraging biological, clinical, and technical heterogeneity across heterogeneous data to accelerate clinical translation. His lab has applied these methods for identification of immune response-based disease signatures that are diagnostic, prognostic, therapeutic and mechanistic across a broad spectrum of diseases including infections, autoimmune diseases, cancer, organ transplant, and vaccination. He is also a co-founder and Chief Scientist of Inflammatix, Inc., a commercial-stage company with FDA-cleared test focused on translating host response-based diagnostics to clinical care.

Vincent Noireaux is a Professor of Synthetic Biology and Biological Physics at the University of Minnesota. His lab utilizes cell-free transcription-translation (TXTL) to engineer biochemical systems outside of cells, including gene circuits, phages, and synthetic cells. Vincent earned a Ph.D. at the Curie Institute in Paris and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at The Rockefeller University in New York City.

Jevgenij Raskatov was born in Moscow, Russia. In 1994 his family moved to Germany, where he studied chemistry as an undergraduate at Heidelberg University. This was followed by a move to Oxford to perform his PhD studies in organic chemistry. In 2009 he moved to Caltech as a Humboldt postdoctoral fellow. He has held an independent position at University of California, Santa Cruz since 2014, where he is currently Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry. The Raskatov lab studies aggregating peptidic systems involved in Alzheimer’s and Diabetes. The lab is also interested in developing peptidic materials based on the rippled beta-sheet, which is an intriguing structural motif predicted by Pauling and Corey in 1953.

Lynn Rothschild is an evolutionary biologist, astrobiologist, and synthetic biologist at NASA’s Ames Research Center as well as adjunct professor at both Brown University and Stanford University. Lynn received a B.S. in biology from Yale University, an M.A degree in zoology, and a Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology from Brown University. Her research spans into how life—especially microbes—evolved in Earth’s unique environments and how these lessons could apply to potential life beyond our planet. Lynn founded NASA’s program in synthetic biology and explores how it could play a pivotal role in the future of space travel. Rothschild was the principal investigator of the first free-flyer synthetic biology payload, which flew on the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt’s Euglena and Combined Regenerative Organic-Food Production in Space (EuCROPIS) mission. Lynn’s interest in synthetic cells is two-fold: how it can inform the origin, evolution and search for life elsewhere as well as how they could aid in space exploration and settlement. She has been named a NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts fellow five times and in 2015, Rothschild was awarded the Horace Mann Medal by the Brown University

Graduate School as well as the American Humanist Association’s Isaac Asimov Science Award. She is a fellow of the Linnean Society of London, the California Academy of Sciences, and the Explorer’s Club. She also held the role of president of the Society of Protozoologists from 2002 to 2003.

Jai Rudra received his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Louisiana Tech University and completed his postdoctoral training in the lab of Dr. Joel Collier at the University of Chicago. He was recruited by the Sealy Center for Vaccine Development at the University of Texas Medical Branch as an Assistant Professor in the Fall of 2011, where he developed subunit vaccines based on supramolecular peptides for chronic infectious and noninfectious diseases, as well as drug addiction. Jai joined the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis in the Fall of 2018. His research interests include harnessing of molecular and structural chirality in biomaterials and understanding the influence of chirality on immune cell behavior for applications in vaccine development and regenerative immunology. He is a recipient of the NSF CAREER award, and his lab is supported through active funding from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and National Institute on Aging. Jai is an editorial board member of Nature Partnership Journal npj Vaccines.

Joel Schneider received his Ph.D. in Chemistry at Texas A&M University before moving on to the University of Pennsylvania, School of Medicine as a postdoctoral fellow. After which, he joined the faculty at the University of Delaware (UD). As Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at UD, he was recruited in 2010 to the National Cancer Institute, Center for Cancer Research to serve as Chief and build their new Chemical Biology Laboratory. In his independent research, he develops biomaterials for use in the local delivery of therapeutics towards the treatment of cancer. He is particularly interested in peptide-based hydrogels formed by self-assembly. His work establishes how material composition and structure influences material function, which lays the foundation to ultimately translate materials to the clinic. Joel also serves as a Deputy Director of the Center for Cancer Research as well as the past president of the American Peptide Society. He remains adjunct Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of Delaware.

James Smith is director of The Mirror Biology Dialogues Fund and an adjunct faculty at the J. Craig Venter Institute. He focuses on biological risks from new and future technologies, and his previous experience spans industry, academic and policy roles. He has recently held positions at think tanks focused on biosecurity, as a senior fellow at the Center for Long Term Resilience and a Research Fellow at RAND. Prior to this, he was the head of global strategy for Alvea, a vaccine company that completed a phase 1 clinical trial for an omicron targeted pDNA vaccine, where he led regulatory, quality, and some aspects of product development. Dr. Smith previously led a portfolio of consultancy work focused on early stage healthcare assets for research institutes, start-ups, large companies, and other stakeholders. Dr. Smith holds an undergraduate degree (biological sciences) and UK Medical Research Council funded doctoral degree (medical sciences) from the University of Oxford. He was also a postdoctoral scientist and senior postdoctoral scientist at the University of Oxford, in the Nuffield Department of Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences and the Centre for Statistics in Medicine, a Fellow of Reproducible Research Oxford, and a SENS Research Foundation Scholar at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute.

Jonathan Sczepanski began his independent career at Texas A&M University in 2015 where he is currently a Professor of Chemistry and of Biochemistry and Biophysics. His research group combines expertise in nucleic acids chemistry, chemical and molecular biology, and directed evolution to address biologically relevant questions and human health needs. Key focus areas include (1) exploiting the bio-orthogonal nature of mirror image DNA and RNA for applications in biotechnology and medicine and (2) uncovering the molecular mechanisms underlying the regulation of DNA repair and DNA (de)methylation in biology and disease. Jonathan has made important contributions in diverse fields, including nucleic acid aptamers, molecular biosensors, DNA nanotechnology, and DNA repair biology. His research has garnered support from the National Institutes of Health (NIGMS, NIBIB, NIAID, and NICHD), the National Science Foundation, the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT), and Welch grants. He earned a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Johns Hopkins University in 2010 under the guidance of Prof. Marc Greenberg and pursued postdoctoral training at The Scripps Research Institute with Prof. Gerald Joyce.

Gregory Went is a scientist, inventor, investor, experienced entrepreneur and board member with multiple startups in the life sciences, including genomics, genetics, diagnostics and therapeutics. His companies have taken multiple products from invention through approval and commercialization, benefiting the lives of thousands of patients and their care partners. His journey began early in his Ph.D. program in Chemical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. During his post-doc at Cornell, he co-founded CuraGen Corporation, one of the first genomics companies, where he co-led the development of CuraGen’s genomics platform and led the corporate partnering efforts. After spending about 5 years supporting VC firms and entrepreneurs, he co-founded Adamas Pharmaceuticals, serving as its CEO and Chairman, where the company discovered, developed and launched two commercial products: Namzaric® (with Allergan) and GOCOVRI®. He joined Dextera Biosciences in 2020, a company attempting to develop a new category of drugs called synthetic D-Proteins. His initial role was as an investor/Board member, but he then stepped into his current role as CEO and Chairman to drive the development of its platform and programs to the clinic.

Beat Vögeli specializes in the development and application of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) techniques to explore conformation and communication networks within and between proteins and nucleic acids. His current primary research interests include investigating functional disorder in microtubule-based intracellular transport and dynamics and functions of Z-form RNA and DNA. He earned his Ph.D. from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zürich, pursued research at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, and now is an associate professor at the University of Colorado at Denver - Anschutz Medical School.