Building Absco Therapeutics as a 2024-25 Blavatnik Fellow

Founder and CEO of a stealth-phase biotechnology startup launching out of work at MIT and MGH

As former President and now Chairman of the Board of Sling Health (formerly known as IDEA Labs), I work with top innovative students, mentors, investors, and companies nationally to enable medical entrepreneurship. Sling Health is a charitable nonprofit biotechnology platform that forms teams of medical, engineering, science, business, and law students around biotechnology problems. We then provide the facilities, mentors, and resources needed for these teams to create new technologies, business plans, and patents.Our team created a leading trainee-focused incubator to launch biomedical technology startups, including a sustainable $200k/year infrastructure, streamlined operations, mentorship, and pro bono legal support. I led the organization's national growth from a single site at Washington University in St. Louis into a network with 10 chapters. I work with fantastic colleagues to develop a sustainable infrastructure, establish Sling Health at new universities, and create university, foundation, hospital, and corporate partnerships to facilitate students inventing and commercializing improved medical technology.We have collectively supported >1100 participants nationally, >200 teams, >125 prototypes, and >25 national competition finalists. Some successful Sling Health companies include CareSignal (digital health exit, acquired by Lightbeam) and Geneoscopy ($105M Series B in 2021). Nature Biotechnology published three feature articles on our innovative system's structure, growth, and initiatives. Sling Health has drawn major keynote speakers, including Mark Levin and Dr. Robert Langer.

I advise a digital health startup on product needs, clinical use strategy and evaluation, and healthcare economics

Served on a committee that designed and implemented a new educational program on innovation and entrepreneurship in biomedicine at Washington University

Between defending my PhD and returning to the clinical parts of medical school in the fall, I worked at Third Rock Ventures. I led early-stage scientific research and business exploration for cell engineering therapies, which provided the initial basis that eventually created Abata Therapeutics (launched 2021).- Interviewed over 100 leading academic scientists to explore budding technologies- Assessed lead technologies' market potential and path to clinical trials- pitched promising new company opportunities to Third Rock Ventures partners- Developed a Third Rock-wide conference featuring immune cell engineering Key Opinion Leaders

I helped develop and lead a pilot class called Clinical Applications of BME for sophomore biomedical engineers at Washington University in St. Louis. This course exposed undergraduate students to the clinical environment and teaches them how to identify clinical needs through objective observation. The course begins with a 3 week in class primer (Two 90 minute lectures each week) where students receive HIPAA training, learn proper hospital etiquette, develop objective observational skills, and are introduced to the variety of medical fields that they can shadow. Following the course primer students rotate in 4 different medical fields and receive one-on-one guidance from a clinician. Each rotation lasts for 2 weeks and finishes with a discussion section where students share their observations and potential clinical needs with the class. After all rotations are completed students select one medical field and spend an additional 2 weeks visiting and researching the field. The course concludes with students presenting a relevant clinical need they identified in their chosen medical field.

PI: Professor Eben Alsberg, Biomedical Engineering• Created and tested a novel system to generate physical and chemical gradients in chemically crosslinked scaffolds for tissue engineering.