Suzie Chen, Ph.D. is a Full Professor in the Department of Chemical Biology, Susan Lehman Cullman Laboratory for Cancer Research, Ernest Mario School of Pharmacy, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. She has authored or co-authored over 60 peer-reviewed papers and book chapters. Dr. Chen serves as a reviewer for many reputed journals. She is widely recognized as an international expert in the molecular mechanisms of melanoma development. Dr. Chen is a charter member of the Tumor Cell Biology Study Section at NCI, and serves as a reviewer for other NCI study sections. She earned her Ph.D. in Genetics from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY. She then was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Biological Sciences at Columbia University, NY.

Nancy Connell, Ph.D. is Professor of Infectious Disease in the Department of Medicine at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ), New Jersey Medical School. A Harvard University Ph.D. in Microbiology, Dr. Connell is the Director of the UMDNJ Center for Biodefense which has been the recipient of $12.5 million in funding for research into detection and diagnosis of biowarfare agents and in development of biodefense preparedness training programs. Dr. Connell serves as Director of the Regional Biocontainment Laboratory (RBL) of the Biosafety Level Three (BCL3) facility of UMDNJ’s Center for the Study of Emerging and Re-emerging Pathogens and chairs the University’s Institutional Biosafety Committee. Dr. Connell has authored more than 40 peer reviewed publications and has had fifteen years’ continuous funding by the NIH and the DoD. Dr. Connell is the past Chair of the CSR Study Section (BM-1/HBIP) at NIH that reviews bacterial pathogenesis submissions to NIAID, and continues to review grant proposals in infectious disease and biodefense for the NIH. Dr. Connell has served on several committees of the National Academy of Sciences/Institute of Medicine, e.g., the Committee on Advances in Technology and the Prevention of their Application to Next Generation Biowarfare Agents (2004-2006), and the Committee on Testing and Evaluation of Biological Stand-off Detection Systems (2006-2007).

William F. DeGrado, Ph.D. is the George W. Raiziss Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. DeGrado is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. His distinguished published research includes contributions to the fields of protein design, synthesis of peptidomimetics, and characterization of membrane-active peptides.

Rima McLeod, M.D. is a Professor at the University of Chicago in the Departments of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences and Pediatrics (Infectious Diseases) and the Committees on Genetics, Molecular Medicine, and Immunology. Dr. McLeod specializes in infectious diseases, and studies the pathogenesis, prevention, and treatment of toxoplasmosis and related parasitic diseases. Dr. McLeod trained at the University of California, San Francisco and the University of Pennsylvania and was a Fellow in Infectious Diseases at Stanford University. She is an author of more than 100 original scientific papers, many book chapters and monographs. She is also Principal Investigator on several NIH grants and serves on advisory panels and as a reviewer for numerous reputed journals.

management team | board of directors | scientific advisors | key personnel