Mentors for the 2017 Innovation Lab: Microbiome

Dr. Charles Epstein is a Thomas A. Scott Professor of Mathematics in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the founder and chair of the Applied Mathematics and Computational Science graduate group at Penn. Dr. Epstein’s interests include Partial Differential Equations, Maxwell's Equations, Population Genetics, Medical Imaging, Several Complex Variables, Microlocal Analysis and Index Theory, and Numerical Analysis.

Dr. Katherine Kim is an assistant professor at the University of California Davis, Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. Dr. Kim returns again this year to serve as an Innovation Lab mentor. Her research focuses on the use of mobile, social, and distributed systems to improve care coordination, community health, and research. Dr. Kim has over 20 years of experience as a hospital and clinic manager, an entrepreneur and CEO in a venture-funded startup, and in software product development.

Dr. Pieter Dorrestein is an Associate Professor at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Dorrenstein works on the development of mass spectrometry approaches to visualize metabolic exchange in a spatial and system-wide manner. This includes deployment of mass spectrometry computational approaches to structurally characterize molecules involved in metabolic exchange and monitor their dynamics.

Dr. Kjersti Aagaard is Professor and Vice Chair at the Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Molecular and Human Genetics, Molecular and Cell Biology, and Molecular Physiology and Biophysics at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Aagaard investigates microbiome interactions in relation to risk of preterm birth, and has a long-standing interest in understanding what impacts the in utero environment, and how modifications in our epigenome and metagenome parlay into fetal programming and life-long health and disease.

Dr. Curtis Huttenhower is an Associate Professor of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health and an Associate Member at the Broad Institute. Dr. Huttenhower's lab focuses on computational methods for functional analysis of microbial communities, including the human microbiome in autoimmune disease such as IBD, and its potential as a diagnostic tool and point of therapeutic intervention.

Dr. Hongzhe Li is Professor of Biostatistics and Statistics at the University of Pennsylvania, Chair of the Biostatistics Graduate Program, and Director of the Center for Statistical Methods in Big Data. Dr. Li's lab is conducting both methodological and collaborative research in the area of statistical genetics/genomics and metagenomics, with the goal of understanding the genetic and genomic bases of complex biological systems, including initiation and development of complex human diseases.

Mentors for the 2017 Innovation Lab: Microbiome

Dr. Charles Epstein is a Thomas A. Scott Professor of Mathematics in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Epstein’s interests include Partial Differential Equations, Maxwell's Equations, Population Genetics, Medical Imaging, Several Complex Variables, Microlocal Analysis and Index Theory, and Numerical Analysis.

Dr. Katherine Kim is an assistant professor at the University of California Davis, Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing. Dr. Kim returns again this year to serve as an Innovation Lab mentor. Her research focuses on the use of mobile, social, and distributed systems to improve care coordination, community health, and research. Dr. Kim has over 20 years of experience as a hospital and clinic manager, an entrepreneur and CEO in a venture-funded startup, and in software product development.

Dr. Pieter Dorrestein is an Associate Professor at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Dorrenstein works on the development of mass spectrometry approaches to visualize metabolic exchange in a spatial and system-wide manner. This includes deployment of mass spectrometry computational approaches to structurally characterize molecules involved in metabolic exchange and monitor their dynamics.

Dr. Kjersti Aagaard is Professor and Vice Chair at the Departments of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Molecular and Human Genetics, Molecular and Cell Biology, and Molecular Physiology and Biophysics at Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Aagaard investigates microbiome interactions in relation to risk of preterm birth, as well as how, when and why the microbiome is established during early development. She has a long-standing interest in understanding what impacts the in utero environment, and how modifications in our epigenome and metagenome parlay into fetal programming and life-long health and disease.

Dr. Curtis Huttenhower is an Associate Professor of Computational Biology and Bioinformatics at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health and an Associate Member at the Broad Institute. Dr. Huttenhower's lab focuses on computational methods for functional analysis of microbial communities, including the human microbiome in autoimmune disease such as IBD, and its potential as a diagnostic tool and point of therapeutic intervention.

Dr. Hongzhe Li is Professor of Biostatistics and Statistics at the University of Pennsylvania, Chair of the Biostatistics Graduate Program, and Director of the Center for Statistical Methods in Big Data. Dr. Li's lab is conducting both methodological and collaborative research in the area of statistical genetics/genomics and metagenomics, with the goal of understanding the genetic and genomic bases of complex biological systems, including initiation and development of complex human diseases.