Childhood summers spent on the New Jersey shore instilled a lifelong love of the ocean.
Growing up only a few miles from AT&T Bell Labs I have been a lifelong nerd.
Graduated in 3 years from Williams with a double major and highest honors in both physics and biology.
Magna cum laude.
Phi Beta Kappa.
Sigma Xi.
Built a tunable organic dye laser microbeam from scratch.
Spent the summer before my senior year studying hermit crabs in the lab and in the ocean with the Chairman of the Williams Biology Department, Bill Grant, resulting in my first scientific publication.
Earned my Ph.D. in Biological Oceanography from the MIT/WHOI Joint Program, but with a molecular biology thesis on DNA repair in E. coli.
As a Chaim Weitzmann Postdoctoral Fellow at MIT I established the first recombinant DNA lab in the department focusing on site-directed mutagenesis and automation of DNA sequencing.
I joined Genex, one of the original four recombinant DNA companies, as employee number six and their second bench scientist. I became Vice President for Advanced Technology and launched the field of Protein Engineering.
I held an appointment as Adjunct Professor at the Baltimore County campus of the University of Maryland, located outside of Baltimore, where I convinced them to launch the nation's first degree program for biotechnology technicians.
While at Genex I served on the advisory committee planning the establishment of the Center for Advanced Research in Biotechnology (CARB), a joint venture among the University of Maryland, the National Bureau of Standards (now NIST) and Montgomery County. I would become the founding Director of CARB with its focus on structural molecular biology, protein engineering and rational drug design, designing its initial facilities and hiring its initial staff.
While at CARB I was asked to serve as the Founding Director of the Bioelectronic Materials Laboratory under the first 5-year phase of the Frontier Research Program at RIKEN focusing on engineering 2D arrays of electron transfer proteins.
Returning to Massachusetts, I founded the first dedicated genomics company, three years before the launch of the Human Genome Project, focused on a direct, single-molecule sequencing technology to deliver the $1,000 Genome.
I held an Adjunct Professorship appointment in BU's Engineering Department assisting their new Dean, Charles DeLisi, in launching the Center for Advanced Biotechnology (CAB) and recruiting Charles Cantor as its founding scientist.
SEQ's first investor, Jim Morgan of Morgan Holland Ventures, introduced me to Stan Lapidus to help him launch Exact Laboratories (now Exact Sciences) to develop a non-invasive test for colorectal cancer, today's COLOGUARD®. I served on the Scientific Advisory Board helping to recruit other members such as Bert Vogelstein and Ken Kinzler and was co-inventor on Exact's first few patents.
Following Exact's IPO in January 2001 I served as a full-time consultant developing a micro fluidic droplet generator for amplified single-molecule fluorescent detection to replace their original assay format.
I launched my second genomics company, initially focused on the genomics of skin and hair follicles, employing laser capture micro dissection of human scalp tissue and automated DNA sequencing with ABI 3700's and a DEC ALPHA cluster for sequence analysis.
Having developed single-molecule DNA amplification while consulting for Exact I launched my third genomics company to develop a massively parallel version of Sanger DNA sequencing employing controlled pore microencapsulation and adapting industrial scale printing technology for gel formation, electrophoresis and imaging.
I consulted full-time for Helicos, Stan Lapidus' next startup, developing the microfluidics for their direct single-molecule DNA sequencing platform, a variant on SEQ's original technology developed by Steve Quake that finally demonstrated the method.
Returning to Really Tiny Stuff after Helicos I continued to develop the single-molecule Sanger sequencing technology. Rich Horan, SEQ's initial CEO, would then fund its transformation into Genome Corporation as the Executive Director of the Slater Technology Fund in Rhode Island.
The 2008 global market crash would wipe out Genome Corp just before closing a $5M A round financing with Bill Frezza at Adams Capital Management. I would briefly consult full-time with Rade Drmanac at Complete Genomics on a wafer-scale implementation of his DNA-nanoball sequencing method before belt tightening.
An unsuccessful attempt was made to license Genome Corp's micro encapsulation IP.
I consulted full-time for Larry Gold and SomaLogic to develop a micro fluidic implementation of their SomaScan® massively parallel proteomics assay.
In 2010 I returned to my ocean roots in Woods Hole with a Visiting Scientist appointment at MBL, trying to convince them to create a Marine 'Omics Institute with WHOI modeled on Broad.
I was a Guest Investigator at WHOI, initially trying to convince them to establish a Marine 'Omics Institute with MBL modeled on the Broad, which fell on deaf ears. I would subsequently work in the Office of Applied Oceanography (now Technology Licensing).
While consulting for SomaLogic I launched this 501(c)(3) to study the scale-up of ocean iron fertilization for carbon sequestration, but there was global pushback by the scientific community to the concept because of several for-profit companies making it impossible to raise funding.
The technology I had proposed for Seaquester to monitor large-scale ocean iron fertilization experiments was an enormous, autonomous, diesel-electric submarine "Mother Ship". This platform would thus form the basis for launching nU-Boats and further evolve into undersea inflatables.
nU-Boats would become a subcontractor to Northrop Grumman on DARPA's Manta Ray blended wing body undersea glider, the largest of its kind.
I tried to establish a blue robotics incubator at a former boatyard on Plymouth Harbor but we failed to raise the necessary funding.
I was under retainer to Larry Lukis, the Founder and former Chairman and CTO of Protolabs to introduce him to potential "blue tech" investment opportunities
I launched a student laboratory on Cohasset Harbor with the goal of sequencing the lobster genome that would evolve to become the Cohasset Center for Student Coastal Research (CSCR).
I briefly consulted for Inkbit, introducing them to "blue tech" market opportunities for their unique Vision-Controlled Jetting 3D printing technology. I continue to explore applications of their technology.
