NIH: Jay Bhattacharya
Jayanta "Jay" Bhattacharya this week became the 18th director of the National Institutes of Health, replacing acting Director Matthew Memoli. He was nominated by President Donald Trump last November and confirmed by the US Senate on March 25. Bhattacharya was a professor at Stanford University School of Medicine, where his research focused on population aging and chronic disease. During the COVID pandemic, he coauthored the controversial Great Barrington Declaration. He holds bachelor's, master's, and Ph.D. degrees in economics as well as an M.D. degree from Stanford University.
Agilent Technologies: Heidi Kunz
Agilent Technologies said that Heidi Kunz is resigning from the company's board of directors as well as the firm's compensation committee and nominating and corporate governance committee, effective May 21. She is a former executive VP and CFO for Blue Shield of California.
Becton Dickinson: Gregory Hayes
Becton Dickinson has appointed Gregory Hayes to its board of directors, effective March 26. Hayes is also the executive chairman of the board of directors of RTX, an aerospace and defense company.
Alpenglow Biosciences: Blandine Merino, Mike Rice
Digital pathology and 3D imaging company Alpenglow Biosciences has added Blandine Merino and Mike Rice to its advisory board. Merino previously worked at Guardant Health, where she led teams to expand the use of next-generation sequencing in clinical trials; Freenome, where she was VP of business development; and Agilent Technologies, where she led global NGS-based oncology diagnostics product strategy and development and later developed a digital pathology strategy. She holds an M.S. in molecular biology from the University of Paris-Saclay and an M.S. in engineering from ISA Graduate School in Bioengineering. Rice is the former chairman and CEO of BioLife Solutions, which he grew from fewer than 10 to more than 500 employees.
Geneoscopy: Amit Bhalla
Geneoscopy has appointed Amit Bhalla as its CFO. He will support the launch of the firm’s ColoSense RNA-based, noninvasive colorectal cancer screening test. Bhalla has more than 25 years of experience in healthcare finance, strategy, and investment. He was most recently executive VP and CFO at Sampled, a biorepository and laboratory. Before that, he was VP of global strategy and development at Becton Dickinson, where he was also a member of the executive management committee. St. Louis-based Geneoscopy closed a $105 million Series C financing round in January to support the commercialization of ColoSense.
For additional recent items on executive appointments, promotions, and departures in the omics and molecular diagnostics space, please see the People in the News page on our website.