PANDEMICTECH - Key Persons

Job Titles:

• Fellow

Angel Desai has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to work with ISID's ProMED using digital epidemic surveillance data to produce AI-guided, actionable forecasts in real time in support of outbreak response and humanitarian health emergency activities across the globe. PandemicTech is a community of innovators based in Austin, Texas, dedicated to fighting pandemic infectious disease threats by bridging the gap between the infectious disease community and technology. With the support of this fellowship, Dr. Desai will work with the ProMED team, with colleagues at Imperial College London and at Harvard's HealthMap to incorporate data from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic into the forecasting models. Dr. Desai is an infectious disease physician and researcher interested in leveraging informal surveillance methodologies to discern epidemiological trends on emerging diseases and outbreaks. She obtained her Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University in 2007 and M.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2013. She received her Master's of Public Health from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. She is an Emerging Leader in Biosecurity Initiative Fellow through the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and an Emerging Leader in International Infectious Diseases through ISID.

Job Titles:

• Fellow

Job Titles:

• Senior Advisor

Bio Based in Austin, Texas, Bill Wood is one of the most experienced venture capitalist in Texas. His track record spans over three decades and parallels the emergence of Austin as one of the world's strongest technology driven economies. He has provided start-up financing, board level guidance and mentoring to dozens of start-ups, several of which have sustained multi-billion dollar market capitalizations. Bill is a past recipient of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur-of-the-Year award. He was also the winner of the Austin Technology Summit's "Pillar of the Community" award, recognizing his lifetime contribution to the community. Finally, he was the inaugural inductee into the Austin Technology Hall of Fame. Bill founded or co-founded two of the most active venture firms in Texas. In 1984, he was one of the original founding partners of Austin Ventures which went on to become the largest firm in the region with over $3 billion of capital under management. In 2006, he founded Silverton Partners which is now the most active venture firm in the state. In 2018, Bill retired from Silverton Partners but continues to invest in early stage companeis through his family office. Bill graduated from Brown University, Phi Beta Kappa and Magna Cum Laude. He received his MBA from Harvard University. Bill has served on the Board of Trustees of Brown University and is a Trustee Emeritus of the University.

Job Titles:

• Fellow

Blaine Doyle has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to continue scaling his company, GlowDx, and its testing efforts across Latin America in the battle against COVID-19. Currently GlowDx is focused on adapting their home testing model to COVID-19, enabling people to get access to testing for COVID-19 while sheltering in place. This will also take significant pressure off of healthcare centres by reducing patient traffic and reducing nosocomial transmission of COVID-19. PandemicTech is a community of innovators based in Austin, Texas, dedicated to fighting pandemic infectious disease threats by bridging the gap between the infectious disease community and technology. "With the support of this fellowship, we aim to increase test availability within the region and subdue this health crisis," declared CEO, Blaine Doyle. "We are excited to be a part of this exciting network of innovators who are seeking to tackle COVID-19 and future health threats with novel technologies." Blaine is a molecular biologist turned entrepreneur focused on democratising access to diagnostics in emerging markets. He is an alum of Biotechnology DCU & Molecular Cell Biology with Bioinnovation UCC. He also considers himself an alum of IndieBio, Séan O'Sullivan's Biotech Accelerator, which he states "changed my perception of the world and technologies place in our future." Blaine is a board member of the Irish Mexican Chamber, bridging business from Ireland to Latin America.

Job Titles:

• Fellow
• Founder and CEO of Ibhar Technologies

Cornelious Bernard, Founder and CEO of Ibhar Technologies (Bangalore, India), has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to support development of an Infection Prevention and Control Index that can help organizations gain insights into how well their infection control programs are functioning and bring about necessary improvements. Ibhar will also collaborate with PandemicTech and the UNAIDS Health Innovation Exchange to pursue its goal of scaling its solutions globally.

Job Titles:

• Fellow
• Director of the Nanotechnology Research Centre

Dr. Amal Kasry has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 in support of a joint project between the British University in Egypt (BUE) and the American University in Cairo (AUC), together with their industrial partner Nano Gate, to create a novel optical sensor that can be used for earlier detection and diagnosis of COVID-19. COVID-19 has shown to be a highly infectious virus in comparison with other known strains of coronaviruses. Current techniques to detect the virus mainly rely on the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test, which requires having a sample carefully taken from the throat of the patient, can take days to be analyzed, and does not always provide highly accurate results. Together with her colleagues from AUC, Dr. Kasry's aim is to develop a specific and sensitive optical sensor to identify COVID-19 by detecting its Spike protein. Both teams have long experience in developing optical biosensors, and their work will target the development of a sensor that can give results in less than one hour and would help detect the virus at early stage, potentially even before showing any symptoms. Dr. Kasry is currently the Director of the Nanotechnology Research Centre (NTRC) at the British University in Egypt. She is a physicist who has been fascinated by developing high sensitivity biosensors to detect diseases at their earliest stages. After earning Bachelor and MSc degrees in Physics from Cairo and Ain Shams Universities, she won a fellowship from the Max Planck Society and obtained her PhD in Materials Science and Biophysics from the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research and the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany. Her research group focuses on biosensing technologies, protein interactions, and nanomaterials and their applications in the field of biotechnology. She maintains several ongoing international projects with partners in Australia and Austria.

Job Titles:

• Co - Founder
• Physician, Venture Capital Investor

Bio Dr. Andrew Nerlinger is a physician, venture capital investor, and social impact innovator. He is the Co-founder of PandemicTech, an Austin-based venture philanthropy launched in 2016 that supports health security innovators on the front lines of fighting pandemic infectious disease threats. He is also a Venture Partner at Bill Wood Ventures, an Austin-based family office that invests in early stage technology companies. He is the co-founder and Managing Director of Endura Ventures, an Austin-based management consultancy that advises clients on healthcare investment and philanthropy. Dr. Nerlinger previously was a Partner at Vesalius Ventures, an early stage telemedicine and digital health venture capital firm based in Houston, and served as an international business development consultant for Biodex, a nuclear medicine and physical medicine and rehabilitation device company based in Shirley, New York. He is a graduate of the Yale University School of Medicine (MD, 2006) and the University of Notre Dame (BS, Mathematics and Philosophy, 2002).

Job Titles:

• Leader
• Senior Advisor

Bio Dr. Biju Jacob is an experienced leader in innovation strategy, research infrastructure and start-up advisory with a decade of experience in early-stage discovery, clinical research and regulatory affairs. He has worked in both large organizations and start-ups with deep medical research & management experience. Academically trained as a medical geneticist and a serial entrepreneur by passion, Dr. Jacob has advised 100+ biomedical/healthcare startups in conceptualizing, building, and running new ventures through Starthealth-Unitus Seed Fund, Axilor Ventures, CAMTech- Massachusetts General Hospital. He is a recipient of BIRAC Innovation 2014 award, ISBA National award for entrepreneurship 2010 and CV Raman Young Scientist Awards 2007

Job Titles:

• Fellow

Fatima Aziz, a Ph.D. student at the University of Karachi and a Research Coordinator in the Infectious Diseases Research Laboratory at Aga Khan University, has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to support her efforts to develop technology-driven communications that improve biosafety and biosecurity training capacity in Pakistan. Fatima is a Ph.D. student in microbiology at the University of Karachi where she currently studies respiratory viruses. She is concurrently a Research Coordinator in the Infectious Diseases Research Laboratory at Aga Khan University and has served as an American Society for Microbiology (ASM) Young Ambassador to Pakistan. Fatima has been a mentor for the Global Health Security Initiative NextGen Mentorship Program, holds certifications from the International Federation of Biosafety Associations (IFBA) and the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL), and has trained internationally in the United States, UAE, Kenya, United Kingdom, and South Korea.

Job Titles:

• Director of Policy
• Fellow
• CEO of EpiAFRIC
• Public Health Physician from Nigeria

Ifeanyi Nsofor is a public health physician from Nigeria. Dr. Nsofor is Director of Policy and Advocacy at Nigeria Health Watch and leads the organisations' advocacy interventions. He is a leading advocate for universal health coverage in Nigeria. He serves as CEO of EpiAFRIC. Ifeanyi received his medical degree from Nnamdi Azikiwe University School of Medicine. As a 2006 Ford Foundation International Fellow at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Ifeanyi obtained a Masters in Community Health degree. He is an alumnus of Harvard Kennedy School's Strategic Frameworks for Non-profit Organizations. He has led 17 research projects across Sierra Leone, Liberia, Guinea, Ghana and Nigeria. He was Co-Lead of evaluation of African Union intervention for Ebola Outbreak in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. Ifeanyi is a 2018 New Voices Fellow at the Aspen Institute and is an Atlantic Fellow for Health Equity. He has spoken at TEDxOguiRoad on "without health, we have nothing." Ifeanyi Nsofor, the CEO of EpiAFRIC and Director of Policy and Advocacy at Nigeria Health Watch, has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship to support his work organizing the 2021 Health Meets Tech Pan-African Hackathon.

Job Titles:

• Fellow
• Physician
• CEO and Founder of Wella Health

Ikpeme Neto, CEO and Founder of Wella Health, has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to support his company's work creating epidemiological data collection and visualization tools that support Nigeria's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. He is leading the development of a technology solution that provides a near real-time view of COVID-19 case management resource availability and utilization that will enable authorities to anticipate shortages and target interventions appropriately through actionable insights and advice. Dr. Neto is an internal medicine physician and digital health entrepreneur focused on providing cost-effective technology solutions to improve the quality and affordability of healthcare across Africa. He founded Wella Health in 2017 with the goal of providing healthcare financing for the next billion via affordable micro-insurance health products, including its first offering aimed at malaria. Wella Health was selected for the 2019 Techstars Impact accelerator in Austin and is part of the Catalyst Fund's Inclusive FinTech portfolio. Dr. Neto is also the founder of Digital Health Nigeria, a community focused on promoting the development and use of digital health and telemedicine technologies in Nigeria. He earned his medical degree from Trinity College, Dublin.

Job Titles:

• Staff Member

Job Titles:

• Co - Founder

Bio Lisa McDonald MD, MSTC is the Director of Healthcare for the Austin Technology Incubator (ATI) at The University of Texas at Austin where she drives support for early-stage companies, including pipeline management and economic development collaborations beyond the university community. ATI's Healthcare incubator focuses on meeting the growing need for innovative healthcare products and services with the goal of transforming the healthcare industry. In March of 2020, Dr. McDonald led the formation of the Texas Global Health Security Innovation Consortium (TEXGHS). TEXGHS is a public-private partnership organized by ATI that is built to serve as a convening and coordinating organization to strengthen and address limitations in our community's ability to respond to global health security emergencies. Dr. McDonald co-founded Endura Ventures in 2010, a global health strategic consultancy focused on delivering high impact programs internationally and through public-private partnerships. She launched the PandemicTech virtual incubator in 2016 as a program within Endura Ventures, which was then spun out as a standalone company in 2019. PandemicTech is a virtual technology incubator that connects the global health security and technology communities to support innovative local solutions to pandemic infectious disease challenges. The virtual incubator brings private funding and entrepreneurship models to an issue typically within the domain of governments and philanthropies. It focuses on identifying promising innovators in low and middle-income countries and surrounding them with resources from the international technology community to develop and scale their unique approaches to solving local challenges. Dr. McDonald has been a Faculty Lecturer for the Inventor's Program in the College of Natural Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin. She supports the regional entrepreneurial community as a mentor, judge, speaker and advisory board member for multiple organizations, including the Minority Aids Research Committee, Nursing Innovation Hub, Mass Challenge Texas, 3 Day Startup, Techstars Impact, Blackstone Launchpad, Accelerate South, Austin Community College Bioscience Incubator, SXSW, and the Rice Alliance for Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

Job Titles:

• Senior Advisor
• Safety Manager for Michigan State University and the Alternate Responsible Official for the Federal Select Agent Program

Bio Mr. Ochoa currently serves as the High-Containment Lab/Pandemic Safety Manager for Michigan State University and the Alternate Responsible Official for the Federal Select Agent Program at MSU. Mr. Ochoa has more than 13 years of experience in the field of Biosafety and Biosecurity and experience in serological and molecular diagnosis of respiratory viral infections, exanthematic febrile diseases, HIV, herpes viruses, vector-borne diseases, and antibiotic resistance in hospitalized patients. Mr. Ochoa previously served as the Director of the Epidemiological Surveillance and Research Laboratory Network of the Mexican Institute for Social Security (IMSS) from the Ministry of Health in Mexico. From March 2013 to October 2019 he served as BSL-3 Lab Coordinator at the National Reference Laboratory in Mexico. As the head of the BSL-3 in Mexico he supported the development and implementation of the CWA 15793 (nowadays the ISO 35001 standard), the CWA 16335, and the ISO:9001:2015 standards. Additionally, Mr. Ochoa has participated as a representative of Mexico in the plenary meetings of the Australia Group, and other related events of the Biological Weapons Convention and participated as an expert in the field of Biosurveillance, Biosecurity, Epidemiological Emergency Response and Bioterrorism with the Department of Defense of the United States of America (USSOUTHCOM) and the William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies. Mr. Ochoa received a Master's Degree in Public Health Management focused on Biological Risk Management. He has been an ABSA-International member since 2014, served as the Chair of the Publications Committee, serves as member of the International Engagement Committee, and international editor for Applied Biosafety Journal. As one of the eighteen founding members and past President of the Mexican Biosafety Association (AMEXBIO), he has strengthened the network between biosafety professionals in the region and helped to create strategic alliances with international and national institutions. Additionally, Mr. Ochoa is a member of several biosafety associations like the American Biological Safety Association, the Canadian Association for Biological Safety, the European Biosafety Association. In 2019 he participated in the 1st Edition of the Biosecurity and Diplomacy Workshop from UNODA (United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs).In addition, Mr. Ochoa has served as a mentor of the International Twinning Project from Sandia National Laboratories, the Next Generation Global Health Security Network, and the IFBA Mentorship Program since 2021. In addition, Mr. Ochoa is part of the Safety and Security Committee for iGEM and serves as Senior Advisor for PandemicTech since 2016. Other credentials and certifications that Mr. Ochoa has include: the WHO Certified Expeditor for the transport of infectious substances and certifications in four disciplines: Biorisk Management, Biological Risk Assessment, Biocontainment Facility Design, Operations and & Maintenance, and Biosafety Cabinet Selection, Installation and Safe Use all from the International Federation of Biosafety Associations (IFBA).

Job Titles:

• Consultant and Professor
• Deputy Coordinator for the Next Generation Global Health Security Network
• Expert
• Member of the Safety and Security Committee at IGEM
• Senior Advisor and Innovation Fellow

Bio Mayra Ameneiros is a Consultant and Professor on biosafety and biosecurity. She has a BSc in Biochemistry, a M.S. in blood banks and immunohematology, and a postgraduate degree in international security, disarmament, and non-proliferation of WMD. She is a Certified Professional in biorisk management and biosecurity, from the International Federation of Biosafety Associations (IFBA). Mayra has over a decade of experience in different biochemistry areas and conducting scientific research. Mayra was awarded in 2021 with an Innovation Fellowship from PandemicTech, where she worked in different biosafety and biosecurity projects internationally, and since 2022 she serves as a Senior Advisor. Currently, she is a Research Associate at King´s College London, Department of War Studies, supporting the GlobalBioLabs project, which aims to increase public knowledge about maximum containment facilities around the world and to strengthen national and international biorisk management policies and practices. She is a Director of Strategic Engagement and Development at Biopreparedness International, a company that offers affordable, top-quality, accessible, interactive online Biosafety and Biosecurity training to the world and a Consulting Advisory Board (CAB) member at Merrick & Company´s Life Sciences, supporting current, under-addressed, and emerging issues in the biosafety and biosecurity space. Mayra is engaged in various national and international organizations related to Biosafety, Biosecurity and Global Health Security. Mayra has several roles related to the Global Health Security Agenda Consortium (GHSAC), as she is a member of the Steering Committee, the APP3 group on Biosafety and Biosecurity, and the Task Force on Advocacy and Communications. Mayra is a member of the Safety and Security Committee at iGEM, a lecturer at the iGEM Academy during 2021, and a member of The International Working Group on Strengthening the Culture of Biosafety, Biosecurity and Responsible Conduct in the Life Sciences. Since 2022, Mayra serves as the Deputy Coordinator for the Next Generation Global Health Security Network (NextGen), in this role Mayra is NextGen's liaison to the GHSAC and the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) NGO working group. At the national level, she is a member of the Biosafety and the Biorisk Management Committee at IRAM and the Biosafety and Biosecurity Subcommittee at the Argentinean Association of Microbiology.

Job Titles:

• Senior Advisor

Bio Oyewale Tomori, D.V.M., Ph.D., FAS (Nigeria), NNOM, NAM, is a past President of the Nigerian Academy of Science with experience in virology, disease prevention and control. He was at the University of Ibadan from 1971 to 1994. He later served as the pioneer Vice Chancellor of the Redeemer's University in Nigeria from 2004 to 2011. From 1994 to 2004, he was the virologist for the World Health Organization (WHO)'s Africa Region, establishing the African Regional Polio Laboratory Network. In 1981, he was recognized by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for contributions to Lassa fever research. In 2002, he received the Nigerian National Order of Merit, the country's highest award for academic and intellectual attainment and national development. He has authored/co-authored over 150 scientific publications. Dr. Tomori has served or continues to serve on numerous advisory committees, including: (nationally) - Chair, Lassa Fever Steering Committee, National Laboratory Technical Working Group, Expert Working Group on Polio Eradication and Routine Immunization, etc, and (internationally)- WHO SAGE, WHO Africa Regional Polio Certification Committee, WHO Group of Experts on Yellow Fever Disease, Chairman WHO Yellow Fever Emergency Committee on International Health Regulations, GAVI Board, Vice Chair of U.S. National Academy of Medicine Global Health Risk Framework Commission, and World Bank Interagency Working Group on Financing Preparedness and Response. On COVID19, he served as the Laboratory Planning and Quality Monitoring Adviser to the WHO -AFRO Regional Director and is the Chairman, Ministerial Expert Advisory Committee on Covid19 Health Sector Response. He is an international member of the U.S. National Academy of Medicine and currently Chair, Board of Biovaccines Nigeria Ltd. He is a member of the Global Virome Project Leadership Boardand Senior Fellow, Scowcroft Institute at the Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University. He has authored/co-authored over 160 scientific publications

Job Titles:

• Fellow
• Operations Assistant at New Venture Institute

Raphael Garcia, Operations Assistant at New Venture Institute (NVI) at Flinders University (Adelaide, Australia), has been awarded a PandemicTech Innovation Fellowship for 2020 to support his work designing and manufacturing innovative diagnostics for neglected tropical diseases. He has collaborated with Dr. Endalamaw Gadisa, a microbiologist at the Armauer Hansen Research Institute (Addis Ababa, Ethiopia), to develop a new low-cost rapid diagnostics test kit for Cutaneous Leishmaniasis (CL). This test kit utilizes a Micro-Culture testing method which reduces overall diagnostics costs while being more sensitive and faster than other commonly used testing methods for this disease. Raphael has extensive experience in product design, prototyping, and product validation through the use of additive manufacturing (3D printing) and design thinking methodologies. He is a facilitator for the award-winning Flinders University New Venture Institute's Innovative Manufacturing Accelerator program and the eNVIsion Business Incubator Program, which assists businesses in finding pathways to solutions and sustainable growth. He earned a B.Eng. in Mechatronics Engineering from the University of Adelaide.

Job Titles:

• Co - Founder of Nano Gate

Rehab Amin is the Co-Founder of Nano Gate, a Cairo-based nanotechnology startup company. She is a Professor of nanobiophotonics at Egypt's National Institute of Laser Enhanced Sciences (NILES) at Cairo University, where her academic interests include nanotechnology, microbiology, biotechnology, and biosafety and biosecurity. She earned a Ph.D. from NILES in biomedical applications of laser technology and was a Fulbright visiting scholar at Harvard University. Dr. Amin is an advisor for PandemicTech (Austin, Texas, USA), a virtual technology incubator that supports innovators and innovations confronting pandemic infectious disease threats.

Job Titles:

• Senior Advisor
• CEO of UpGlobal
• Journalist, Global Health Expert

Bio Sarah is a journalist, global health expert, patent holder and certified project management professional. As Senior Advisor for PandemicTech, she works to cultivate relationships with local and international partners building public private partnerships between academic institutions, foregin trade organizations, startups and small business owners and for-profit fortune 500 companies for global health. Sarah previously worked at Baylor College of Medicine as Director of the Global Innovation Center and previously served as Adjunct Professor and Associate Director of Global Medical Innovation at Rice University and at Baylor College of Medicine. Sarah is the CEO of UpGlobal, an advisory network for startups, universities and students to facilitate innovation and technology commercialization, life science education and business development opportunities in the Texas Medical Center, Austin, Europe, Asia Pacific, Africa, Central and South America and the Middle East. She is also a founding member of Texas Global Health Innovation Security Consortium (TEXGHS). She works directly with foreign direct investment agencies, government agencies, chambers of commerce in the US and beyond with proven success in building dozens of public private partnerships and generating over $6 million USD in funding for academic institutions, startups and for-profit fortune 500 companies in global health innovation. Sarah earned her bachelors of journalism from the University of Texas at Austin and still works closely with University partners through the Texas Global Health Security Innovation Consortium, an arm of the University of Texas Austin Technology Incubator (ATI). She completed her Masters of Public Health from the University of Texas Health Science Center's School of Public Health in Houston and co-founded the Student Society for Global Health while focusing on management and policy.

Job Titles:

• Innovation Fellow
• Manager, Portfolio and Innovation for Social Alpha

Sumanyu is the Manager, Portfolio and Innovation for Social Alpha - a multistage innovation curation and venture development platform for science and technology start-ups that aim to address the most critical social, economic and environmental challenges. Social Alpha supports entrepreneurs through a network of innovation labs, startup incubators, accelerator programmes, seed fund and market access mechanisms. As part of the Health team at Social Alpha, he is involved in evaluation and due diligence of startups. He is responsible for regular monitoring of portfolio enterprises and providing them with advisory and execution support. He also works with different ecosystem partners for building the innovation pipeline and for lab-to-market enablement. Sumanyu has earlier worked as a management consultant where he was involved in projects including due diligences, financial modeling, go-to-market strategy development, channel development, market research and competitive benchmarking studies among other strategic projects across sectors and geographies. Prior to that, he was part of the strategy office at a leading home healthcare startup. Sumanyu is an alumnus of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee with an undergraduate degree in Metallurgy and Materials Engineering. He has a keen interest in healthcare delivery and pandemic preparedness, especially for remote and marginalized communities.