PRiME 7th Annual Symposium

Group Leader, Botnar Institute of Immune Engineering and ETH Zürich

Berend Snijder is a group leader at the Botnar Institute of Immune Engineering (BIIE) and ETH Zürich, as well as at the Comprehensive Cancer Center Zürich and the Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (SIB). Research in the Snijder Lab focuses on the systematic functional and multi-omic profiling of human tissues in health and disease, with a strong bioinformatics and clinical/translational focus.

He is a leading figure in the field of functional precision medicine, having developed the pharmacoscopy platform that has led to two successful precision oncology trials (EXALT-1 and DARTT-1), which they currently evaluate in multiple randomized & controlled interventional clinical trials for the treatment of aggressive cancers. 

Berend has co-founded three spin-off companies: Allcyte (acquired by Exscientia, now Recursion); Prevision Medicine, working to implement pharmacoscopy as a scalable functional diagnostic device for oncology; and Graph Therapeutics, developing AI- and functionally driven precision immunology.

President of Bioengineering, Chan Zuckerberg Biohub, Chicago
Neena B. Schwartz Professor, Departments of Chemistry, Biomedical Engineering, and Biochemistry & Molecular Genetics, Northwestern University

Shana Kelley's Research Group has pioneered new methods for tracking molecular and cellular analytes with unprecedented sensitivity. Dr. Kelley’s work has been recognized with the ACS Inorganic Nanoscience Award, the Pittsburgh Conference Achievement Award, the Steacie Prize, an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, a Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar award, a NSF CAREER Award, a Dreyfus New Faculty Award, and she was also named a “Top 100 Innovator” by MIT’s Technology Review. 

Kelley is also a Guggenheim Fellow, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, and the American Institute of Biological and Medical Engineering.

She is an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the National Academy of Inventors. Her work is extensively cited, and she has over 80 papers cited more than 80 times.  Kelley is an inventor on over 50 patents issued worldwide.  

She is a founder of four life sciences companies, GeneOhm Sciences (acquired by Becton Dickinson in 2005), Xagenic Inc. (acquired by General Atomics in 2017), CTRL Therapeutics (founded in 2019) and Arma Biosciences (founded in 2021).  

Vice President & Head, Bayer Co.Lab Cambridge 

Alberto Nobili is the Vice President and Head of Bayer Co.Lab Cambridge at Bayer Pharmaceuticals. Since his appointment in August 2025, he has been instrumental in cultivating strategic partnerships and providing executive guidance to emerging tenants within the Boston innovation ecosystem. Furthermore, he spearheaded the launch of the Bayer Co.Lab Connect program in February 2025, facilitating the global expansion of the incubator network. 

Prior to joining Bayer, Dr. Nobili co-founded Dynamic Cell Therapies Inc., a spinoff from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute dedicated to advancing next-generation CAR-T cell therapies. In this capacity, he played a critical role in securing venture funding, managing intellectual property, and defining the firm’s strategic vision. Additionally, he co-founded 42N Advisors Benefit Corp. in 2021 to support Italian-led high-tech enterprises in the United States. 

Dr. Nobili holds a PhD in Biotechnology from the University of Greifswald, specializing in protein engineering, and completed postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. A distinguished researcher and entrepreneur, he has authored 12 scientific publications and holds eight patent filings, reflecting his significant contributions to the fields of biotechnology and scientific innovation. 

Vice-President, Research and Innovation, and Strategic Initiatives & Professor, Department of Molecular Genetics, Temerty Faculty of Medicine & CSO, Co-founder, Bright Angel Therapeutics

Leah Cowen is Vice-President, Research and Innovation, and Strategic Initiatives at the University of Toronto, Professor in the Department of Molecular Genetics, co-Director of the CIFAR Fungal Kingdom: Threats & Opportunities program, and co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Bright Angel Therapeutics, a company focused on development of novel antifungals. She has received a Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award, Grand Challenges Canada Star in Global Health Award, E.W.R. Steacie Award, and Canada Research Chair in Microbial Genomics & Infectious Disease. She is an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, American Academy of Microbiology, and American Association for the Advancement of Science. Her laboratory takes an interdisciplinary approach to understand how fungi cause human disease and evolve resistance to antifungal drugs, leveraging fundamental insights to advance development of new strategies to treat life-threatening infectious disease. 

CTO, Co-founder, Fable Therapeutics & Professor, Canada Research Chair Tier 1 (Machine Learning in Protein and Peptide Science), University of Toronto 

Philip M. Kim is a professor at the University of Toronto at the Donnelly Centre and the Departments of Computer Science and Molecular Genetics, as well as the Chief Technology Officer of Fable Therapeutics, a biotechnology startup company using AI methods to develop biologics. Fable is developing its own pipeline of therapeutics in the metabolic space and has offices in Toronto and Boston.

In his academic research, Dr. Kim has been developing novel machine learning methods for protein and peptide engineering and authored over 100 publications, 7 invention disclosures and 5 patent applications. He has co-founded several biotechnology companies, including Fable Therapeutics and TBG Therapeutics and serves as consultant and member of the scientific advisory board for others.

Before setting up his lab in 2009, he was a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University and an associate with McKinsey & Co. He holds a Ph.D. from the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and Department of Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.S. in Physics and Biochemistry from the University of Tuebingen. 

Vice President, External Innovation, LS Omics Solutions Group

Jennifer Moody is an industry veteran in enabling cell and gene therapies. Her experience has spanned the value chain from reagent development and raw material sourcing through therapeutic product development. Her expertise includes cell and gene therapy, business operations, technical diligence, alliances and partnerships.

She is currently at Head of External Innovation, Life Science Omics Solutions Group (including Genomic Medicine) at Danaher Corporation, and is based in Toronto, Canada. Previous roles include Gene Therapy Market Development at Pall Corporation, key operational positions at iPSC derived-cell therapy therapeutic startups, Morphocell Technologies and Bluerock Therapeutics, business development and technology diligence leadership at the Centre for the Commercialization of Regenerative Medicine and R&D at STEMCELL Technologies.

She is a stem cell scientist by training, having completed a PhD in Genetics from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver and a postdoc studying hematopoietic stem cells at the Lund Stem Cell Center in Lund, Sweden. Selected for the Pfizer-sponsored AdMare Executive Leadership training program (2019 cohort), Jennifer also serves as a Board member for The Metabolomics Innovation Center, on the Manufacturing, Clinical Translation, and Industry Committee of ISSCR, and as a Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) Advisor.

CEO, Co-founder, boutIQ Solutions Inc. & Professor, Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto  

Julie Audet is a Professor in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Toronto. Her early career was defined by her groundbreaking work within the first group of bioengineers who envisioned stem cell therapy manufacturing. At that time, Prof. Audet successfully applied process engineering methods to expand blood stem cells in culture while maintaining their regenerative capacity, for transplantation. She contributed to many studies and patents over the last 20 years related to the investigation of various stem cell culture systems. 

During the last decade, she has led the development and validation of machine learning algorithms for self-driven exploration of extremely large parameter spaces, specifically tailored for stem cell culture optimization. She is the co-founder of boutIQ solutions and co-inventor of HiDiNeu, boutIQ’s core technology, which has been used successfully to discover chemically-defined cell culture medium for cell therapy, tissue engineering and cellular agriculture.

 Prof. Audet is also dedicated to teaching and training the next generation of biomedical researchers in her area of expertise; she has developed and delivered courses in bioprocess optimization, statistical design of experiments and data analytics.  

Vice President & Head, Bayer Co.Lab Cambridge

Alberto Nobili is the Vice President and Head of Bayer Co.Lab Cambridge at Bayer Pharmaceuticals. Since his appointment in August 2025, he has been instrumental in cultivating strategic partnerships and providing executive guidance to emerging tenants within the Boston innovation ecosystem. Furthermore, he spearheaded the launch of the Bayer Co.Lab Connect program in February 2025, facilitating the global expansion of the incubator network.

Prior to joining Bayer, Dr. Nobili co-founded Dynamic Cell Therapies Inc., a spinoff from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute dedicated to advancing next-generation CAR-T cell therapies. In this capacity, he played a critical role in securing venture funding, managing intellectual property, and defining the firm’s strategic vision. Additionally, he co-founded 42N Advisors Benefit Corp. in 2021 to support Italian-led high-tech enterprises in the United States.

Dr. Nobili holds a PhD in Biotechnology from the University of Greifswald, specializing in protein engineering, and completed postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. A distinguished researcher and entrepreneur, he has authored 12 scientific publications and holds eight patent filings, reflecting his significant contributions to the fields of biotechnology and scientific innovation.

Charles H. Best Chair of Medical Research, Professor and Director Donnelly Centre for Cellular + Biomolecular Research, Department of Biochemistry, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto 

Dr. Stephane Angers is an internationally recognized expert in signal transduction. He earned his Ph.D. from the Université de Montréal in 2002 under the supervision of Dr. Michel Bouvier, where his doctoral research led to the development and application of light energy transfer methodologies to study protein–protein interactions and cellular signalling. From 2002 to 2006, he was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Washington in Seattle in the laboratory of Dr. Randall T. Moon. During this period, he identified and characterized novel components of the Wnt signalling pathway and discovered a new class of E3 ubiquitin ligases. 

In October 2006, Dr. Angers established his independent research program at the University of Toronto, with appointments in the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Faculty of Pharmacy, and the Department of Biochemistry. He currently holds the Canada Research Chair in Functional Architecture of Signal Transduction. His research focuses on understanding Wnt growth factor signalling in development, adult tissue homeostasis, and human disease. His pioneering work has enabled the development of novel antibody-based therapeutics that block or activate Wnt signalling for applications in cancer and regenerative medicine. 

Dr. Angers is the scientific co-founder of AntlerA Therapeutics, which was acquired by Roche in 2024. His work led to the development of Restoret (MK-3000), a trispecific tetravalent FZD4:LRP5 agonist currently in Phase 2b/3 clinical trials for diabetic macular edema. In September 2021, Dr. Angers was appointed Director of the Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research at the University of Toronto. 

Assistant Professor, Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Toronto
Faculty Advisor, Medicinal Chemistry Self-Driving Lab, Acceleration Consortium

Joseph S. Brown is an Assistant Professor at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy (Jan 2026) and Faculty Advisor to the Medicinal Chemistry Self-Driving Lab (MedChem SDL) at the University of Toronto. His research combines automated chemistry, bioassays, and machine learning for peptide and peptidomimetic drug discovery. Before his faculty appointment, Joseph was a Staff Scientist with the MedChem SDL, helping build automated assays and models for the navigation of chemical space for the discovery and optimization of therapeutic candidates. He was previously a PhRMA Foundation Drug Discovery Postdoctoral Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with Bradley Pentelute. Though he led projects in phage display, medicinal chemistry, and automated chemical synthesis of proteins, Joseph specialized in combining machine learning (deep and unsupervised) with affinity selection-mass spectrometry (AS-MS) to identify high-affinity ligands from diverse peptide and abiotic libraries. Last, Joseph earned his PhD in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering from Cornell University with Chris Alabi as a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow. His doctoral work combined organic chemistry and biological characterization to design and evaluate antimicrobial peptidomimetics, establishing mechanistic and structure-activity relationships that continue to inform his approach to molecular design.

Founder, Quthero Professor & Canada Research Chair, Functional Cardiovascular Tissue Engineering, University of Toronto

Dr. Milica Radisic is a Professor at the University of Toronto, Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Organ-on-a-Chip Engineering, and Senior Scientist at the Toronto General Research Institute. She is a co-founder of the Center for Research and Applications in Fluidic Technologies (CRAFT) and a scientific lead of the Human Organ Emulation Self-driving Laboratory within the Acceleration Consortium. She is a Fellow of ten academies and professional societies, including the Royal Society of Canada, the Canadian Academy of Engineering, the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences, the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, and the American Institute for Medical & Biological Engineering.

Dr. Radisic is internationally recognized for pioneering the field of organ-on-a-chip engineering. Her research focuses on organ-on-a-chip platforms and biomaterials that promote healing and attenuate scarring. To overcome limitations of animal models and non-expandable human cardiomyocytes, her lab leverages induced pluripotent stem cells to engineer functional human heart tissues, matured using long-term electrical stimulation to model patient-specific cardiac disease. She also developed novel approaches to tissue vascularization.

She is an Executive Editor for ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering and serves on multiple editorial boards. Dr. Radisic is a co-founder of TARA Biosystems (acquired by Valo Health) and Quthero. She has authored over 260 publications, received more than 26,000 citations (h-index 81), and published in leading journals including Cell, Nature Materials, Nature Methods, and PNAS.

Assistant Scientist, Toronto General Hospital Research Institute, University Health Network
Assistant Professor, Department of Surgery, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto

Dr. Andrew Sage is an Assistant Scientist at UHN and an Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto specializing in multidisciplinary research in biochemistry, pharmaceutical sciences, and lung transplantation research. His program focuses on developing innovative biomarkers and medical devices that improve surgical decision-making and transplant outcomes. Dr. Sage is recognized for ground-breaking achievements such as the world’s first drone-delivered human lung for transplant in 2021 and the creation of InsighTx, a leading machine-learning model for assessing donor lung suitability, in 2023. Most recently, his team has pioneered the development of digital twins of human organs by leveraging UHN’s advanced ex vivo organ perfusion systems.

Professor & Chair, Division of Anatomy, Department of Surgery, University of Toronto
Professor, Institute of Biomedical Engineering

Dr. Cindi Morshead is a tenured Professor and Chair of the Division of Anatomy. She received her PhD from the University of Toronto where her work led to the discovery the endogenous niche for adult neural stem cells. She started her lab in 2003 as a faculty member in the Department of Surgery. Dr. Morshead has achieved significant recognition for her research excellence in the field of stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. She is the recipient of research and mentorship awards and has engaged in a number of leadership roles. Her lab’s expertise is in neurobiology, preclinical models of injury/disease, bioengineering and lineage analyses. Her team has developed innovative methodologies for the treatment of brain injury, contributing to ongoing clinical trials and pursuing novel strategies to activate neural repair mechanisms including the application of electrical stimulation and astrocyte to neuron cellular reprogramming to replace lost cells.

Assistant Professor, University of Toronto

Haissi Cui is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Chemistry. Her research focuses broadly on RNA processes in mammalian cells. To this end, her group develops new chemical tools to probe RNA processes, characterizes cell line and animal models to study rare neurodevelopmental disorders caused by a dysregulation of RNA-binding and modifying proteins, and explores new approaches to RNA therapies. 

Associate Professor, Canada Research Chair in Synthetic Biology, Institute of Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto

Professor Michael Garton is an Associate Professor at the University of Toronto, where he leads a multidisciplinary research group working at the interface of synthetic biology, machine learning, and regenerative medicine. His lab focuses on engineering human cells and gene-delivery systems with enhanced and programmable functions, with particular emphasis on next-generation viral vectors, large-gene delivery, and synthetic regulatory circuits for cell and gene therapy.

Prof. Garton combines generative modelling, protein design, and high-throughput experimental platforms to develop non-immunogenic viral vectors, synthetic receptors, and engineered cellular systems. His group has contributed tools such as FAST-STEM for regenerative medicine and machine-learning frameworks such as ProteinVAE for protein and viral capsid design, enabling iterative design–build–test cycles at unprecedented scale.

Prof. Garton’s research is motivated by the translation of synthetic biology into clinically meaningful therapies, particularly for diseases that remain inaccessible to conventional gene-therapy approaches. He is actively involved in building academic and translational pipelines that bridge fundamental molecular engineering with real-world therapeutic impact.

PhD candidate, University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM) & Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy (LDFP) 

Maryam Ali is a fifth-year PhD candidate in Prof. Jumi Shin’s laboratory at the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM). She completed her Honours Chemistry Co-op degree at the University of Waterloo in 2021. Her doctoral research focuses on both rational engineering and non-rational design of DNA-binding proteins, including synthetic modulators developed for applications in biological circuits and protein therapeutics. A major component of her work involves optimizing a directed evolution platform-enhanced mutagenesis phage-assisted evolution - to improve the robustness and functionality of engineered proteins. 

Over the past two years, Shin’s lab has collaborated with Dr. Micheline Piquette-Miller’s group at the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Toronto, to evaluate anti-cancer protein therapeutics in cell lines and mouse models. Maryam’s 2025 PRiME Fellowship project is titled ‘Designer Protein Drugs for Targeting Breast and Ovarian Cancer.’ 

PhD candidate, University Health Network (UHN) & Faculty of Applied Sciences and Engineering (FASE), University of Toronto 

Ruilin Wu is a graduate student in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology at the University of Toronto, under the supervision of Dr. Jason Fish. His research focuses on understanding the biological mechanisms underlying brain arteriovenous malformations (bAVMs), a vascular disease characterized by abnormal blood vessel growth in the brain that significantly increases the risk of hemorrhage and other serious neurological complications. Currently, there are no validated drug therapies for the treatment of bAVMs. 

With support from the PRiME Fellowship and in collaboration with Prof. Milica Radisic’s laboratory, Ruilin has developed high-throughput human blood vessel models to enable therapeutic screening and to investigate novel drug treatment strategies for this disease. Working alongside interdisciplinary researchers and clinicians, his team aims to advance the future clinical care of brain arteriovenous malformations by developing safe, effective, and precision-based therapeutic options for patients. Ruilin’s 2025 PRiME Fellowship project is titled ‘Development of Precision Therapies for Brain Arteriovenous Malformations.’  

Postdoctoral Fellow, Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), University of Toronto & The Hospital for Sick Children (HSC) 

Sathishkumar Narayanaswamy is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto and a 2025 PRiME Fellow, affiliated with the University of Toronto and The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids). His PRiME Fellowship project is co-funded by Toronto Innovation Acceleration Partners (TIAP). He holds a PhD in Chemical Engineering and has extensive expertise in microfluidics, immunoassay development, and nanomaterial-based diagnostic platforms. His doctoral and postdoctoral research has focused on translating fundamental engineering principles into low-cost, scalable technologies for point-of-care diagnostics and biomedical applications. 

As a PRiME Fellow, Sathish is developing nano-linked PROTACs and bifunctional degraders, integrating nanoparticle engineering with chemical biology to enhance targeted protein degradation for cancer therapy. His work emphasizes bioconjugation strategies and close collaboration across interdisciplinary research teams.  

Sathish has authored peer-reviewed publications, presented at international conferences, and has experience managing research projects, budgets, and collaborative initiatives. His long-term goal is to advance translational technologies that bridge academic research, innovation, and real-world biomedical impact. Outside the lab, he enjoys exploring emerging technologies, refining experimental design strategies, and mentoring trainees interested in diagnostics, nanotechnology, and next-generation therapeutic modalities. 

Postdoctoral Fellow, The Hospital for Sick Children (HSC) & Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), University of Toronto 

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PhD candidate, Faculty of Applied Sciences and Engineering (FASE), University of Toronto & University Health Network (UHN) 

Lily Takeuchi is a fifth-year PhD candidate in the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering at the University of Toronto, conducting her research in Prof. Craig Simmons’ laboratory at the Institute of Biomedical Engineering, in collaboration with Prof. Lorraine Kalia’s laboratory at University Health Network (UHN). Prior to her PhD, she completed her Master’s degree in 2019 in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Centre for Blood Research, University of British Columbia, where she investigated polymer-based therapeutics. 

Her current research focuses on the development of microfluidic systems to model neurodegenerative diseases. Lily’s 2025 PRiME Fellowship project investigates how flow-induced shear stress protects against vascular dysfunction in a stem cell–derived microfluidic model of the blood–brain barrier in Alzheimer’s disease.