Jay Shendure, PhD

Co-Founder & Scientific Advisor

Dr. Shendure is an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Professor of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington. Dr. Shendure's 2005 PhD included one of the first successful demonstrations of massively parallel or next generation DNA sequencing. His research group in Seattle has made significant contributions to technologies including exome sequencing and its application to identify the basis of Mendelian disorders and autism spectrum disorders; genome-wide experimental haplotyping and its application to non-invasive whole genome sequencing of a human fetus; massively parallel reporter assays and saturation genome editing; combinatorial indexing for single cell analyses; and whole organism lineage tracing. He is the recipient of the 2012 Curt Stern Award from the American Society of Human Genetics, the 2013 FEDERAprijs, a 2013 NIH Director's Pioneer Award, and the 2014 HudsonAlpha Life Sciences Prize.

Maitreya Dunham, PhD

Co-Founder & Scientific Advisor

Dr. Dunham is a Fellow of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Associate Professor of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington. She specializes in developing and using high-throughput genomic technologies to study the consequences of genetic variation, from single nucleotide changes to whole extra chromosomes. She works primarily in yeast, but has expanded her research scope to also include human genetic variation and metagenomes. She has also consulted for biotech companies seeking to implement the new tools and methods developed in her lab. Maitreya got her BS in biology from MIT, her PhD in genetics with David Botstein at Stanford University, and started her lab as one of the first Lewis-Sigler Fellows at Princeton University before moving to UW Genome Sciences.

Elhanan Borenstein, PhD

Scientific Advisor

Dr. Borenstein is an Associate Professor of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington, with an adjunct position in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. He is also an external professor at the Santa Fe Institute for complexity science. Dr. Borenstein received his PhD in computer science from Tel-Aviv University, Israel, and held a joint postdoctoral fellowship at the Department of Biology in Stanford and at the Santa Fe Institute. He also has extensive professional experience in the hi-tech industry, where he held top management positions in several hi-tech companies. Dr. Borenstein integrates metagenomic data with methods inspired by systems biology, network theory, machine-learning, and statistical inference to develop a variety of computational methods for studying the human microbiome. His work focuses on reconstructing predictive, systems-level models of the human microbiome and on integrative, multi-metaomic analysis, aiming to provide a better principled understanding of the microbiome and its role in human health. Dr. Borenstein is the recipient of various awards including, most recently, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship and the NIH New Innovator Award.

Andrew Adey, PhD

Scientific Advisor

Dr. Adey is an Assistant Professor of Molecular and Medical Genetics at Oregon Health and Science University and a member of the Knight Cardiovascular Institute. He completed his Ph.D. in Molecular and Cell Biology at the University of Washington and was a recipient of the Distinguished Dissertation Award and the Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award. Dr. Adey has spent his entire career in technology development in the area of high throughput genomics for which he has authored numerous publications and patents. After receiving his doctorate he formed his independent group at OHSU where his lab has focused on the development and deployment of high throughput single cell epigenetics technologies.

Ken Myer

Business Advisor

Ken Myer has over 25 years of successful experience in the technology industry leading companies ranging in size from startups to Fortune 100. Ken currently serves as an interim executive and advisor to technology companies, particularly those undergoing leadership or organizational transition. He is also a Lecturer at the UW Foster School of Business, teaching classes on Leadership of High Performance Organizations and Technology Commercialization. Ken recently served interim executive roles at HydraMaster, Yapta.com, Data I/O and Tarmac24 and previously, Ken was President and Chief Executive Officer of the Washington Technology Industry Association, one of the largest regional technology trade associations in North America. Ken was Executive Vice President of publicly traded Active Voice Corporation and for fifteen years Ken held a variety of executive positions at IBM including General Manager of the Northwest and Intermountain Region, National Executive for the Computer Services Industries, and CFO IBM Northwest. Ken holds an MBA and M.A. from the University of Washington and is currently on the boards of AnswerDash and Forterra. He has been recognized as one of Seattle’s most influential business leaders by Seattle Magazine.

Todd Smith, PhD

Business Advisor

Dr. Smith is a successful bioinformatics entrepreneur. After receiving his PhD in Medicinal Chemistry, he developed bioinformatics software as his team sequenced the BRCA1 gene under Leroy Hood in collaboration with Mary Claire-King. In 1997 he founded Geospiza and led the development of LIMS and high throughput data analysis systems for DNA sequencing and microarray technologies. PerkinElmer acquired Geospiza in 2011 and in 2013 Dr. Smith joined Digital World Biology. In 2015 Dr. Smith co-founded Koan AgroScience where he serves in the role of Chief Science and Technology Officer. Dr. Smith has published in multiple disciplines including chemistry, computer science, genetics/genomics, microbiology, human health, and education. Dr. Smith also serves as an entrepreneur mentor for the University of Washington’s CoMotion business incubator. In that role, he works with emerging businesses to perform market assessments for different technologies in genomics and bioinformatics.