Dr. Heidi Kay is the Founder and CEO of Jericho Sciences, LLC. She is a lead inventor on multiple patents and has nearly 30 years’ experience in cancer and antiviral research. She was formerly a faculty member at the University of South Florida in Chemistry, Environmental Sciences and in Global Health where she collaborated with researchers at the Moffitt Cancer Research Center developing small molecule inhibitors of STAT3 Signal Transducers and Activators of Transcription. Dr. Kay’s current focus is long term remission and reductions of persistent sources of virus in chronic virus infections and addressing therapeutic strategies for emerging viruses.
Dr. Kay earned her Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry in 1999 at the University of South Florida (Tampa) under the Distinguished Professor, Dr. Brian Stevens.
Dr. Haitao Guo is currently a Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and the Co-Leader of the Cancer Virology Program at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center. Dr. Guo’s research focuses on the molecular biology of Hepatitis B Virus, virus-host interactions, innate immunity, and antiviral drug development. He has published over 110 scientific papers and holds three patents. He serves as an editor and/or editorial board member for several leading journals, including Antiviral Research, Journal of Medical Virology, PLOS Pathogens, and Journal of Virology.
Dr. Guo serves as Co-Chair of the Virology Working Group of the International Coalition to Eliminate Hepatitis B (ICE-HBV) and as a member of the Scientific Advisory Council of the International HBV Meeting. In 2022, he was elected to the American Academy of Microbiology (AAM).
Dr. Deanna Kulpa is an Associate Professor at the Emory University School of Medicine in the Department of Pathology and at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in the Division of Microbiology and Immunology. She received her doctoral degree in Human Genetics at the University of Michigan. Dr. Kulpa’s postdoctoral studies were directed by Dr. Kathleen Collins, focusing on mechanisms of immune system evasion by HIV, and then by Dr. Rafick Sékaly, focusing on development of in vitro and ex vivo assays to study HIV latency.
Dr. Kulpa’s research focuses on defining the mechanisms that promote virus persistence for people living with HIV under the current standard treatment of care. Her goal is to identify and evaluate clinical therapeutic strategies toward reducing or eliminating HIV. Dr. Kulpa is a member of the Emory Center for AIDS Research and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Virology.
Dr. Marco Schito is currently the Scientific Director at UGenome AI after serving as a Program Officer at NIH and as the Executive Director of C-Path’s CURE Drug Repurposing Collaboratory and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law. Prior to joining C-Path, Marco was Senior Scientific Officer at the Division of AIDS, NIH where he wrote and managed point-of-care diagnostic contracts, stood up a fully characterized HIV global viral diversity panel program, and launched a research initiative to standardize immune responses in HIV clinical trials. At the National Cancer Institute, Marco led research studies using state-of-the-art models. Over the past decade, he enabled the use of Next Generation Sequencing platforms to identify efficacious tuberculosis drug regimens, which is now being used by the World Health Organization for their global genomic drug surveillance program.
Dr. Schito received his PhD in pathobiology from the Ontario Veterinary College at the University of Guelph, Canada.
Dr. Esther Alegria is a BioPharma Strategic Leader, with over 30 years’ experience in pharmaceutical company research, development and commercialization. Esther was previously the Vice President of Manufacturing and General Manager of Biogen Idec’s Research Triangle Park, North Carolina site, then moved to Hillerød, Denmark as the Senior Vice President of Global Manufacturing to lead the start-up of a second large scale facility, bringing it to commercial manufacturing licensure. She was the Founder and President of APIE Therapeutics, Inc. and a Board Member for both Steris plc and for Avid Bioservices, Inc.
Esther holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Hawaii and an Executive Business Management certification from Harvard Business School.
Dr. Joe Sebastian serves as the Chief Executive Officer of OraLiva. He has more than 25 years of scientific leadership and management roles in lab operations as applied to diagnostics and clinical trials. He served as the senior scientific advisor at Q2Solutions focusing on business development of clinical assays for liver and Infectious diseases . Before joining Q2Solutions, he was the Associate VP and Managing Director of the Molecular Oncology Lab at Labcorp. During this tenure, he also served as the National Discipline Director for molecular infectious diseases where he was involved in the development and approval of HPV, H1N1, HIV, HCV, and HBV diagnostic and treatment monitoring assays.
Dr. Sebastian received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Washington State University and completed postdoctoral work at UNC- Chapel Hill and NIEHS/NIH at RTP, NC. He has published 38 scientific publications including PNAS along with 40 scientific poster presentations at national and international scientific conferences. He is a fellow of the National Academy of Clinical Chemists (AACC) and a member of the American Association of Molecular Pathology.
Shane Cortesi is a registered Patent Attorney of a law firm which advises inventors and entrepreneurs on protecting and licensing their inventions and other intellectual property. A 2005 graduate of The George Washington University Law School, Shane also holds a master’s degree in biotechnology from Northwestern University and a Bachelor’s in Zoology from Miami University.
Wright, Cortesi & Gilbreath was established in January 2023 to combine support across intellectual property, patent law, general litigation, employment, corporate, trust and estate matters. Previously, Shane operated Cortesi Law for 12 years, following his large firm experience in New York. He has subsequently filed and been granted over 100 patent and trademark applications on behalf of small, medium-size and large companies. Shane also provides counsel for securing agreements, forming business entities and advising on legal matters.
Mark Zorko is a CPA and is on the Board and Chair of the Audit Committee for Westell Technologies (NASDAQ: WSTL). He previously chaired Nominating/Governance, Audit and the Strategic Advisory Committees of Perma Pipe International Holdings (NASDAQ: PPIH), in addition to several private company Boards.
He has been a CFO and CIO for manufacturing, business service, health care and high-tech firms. His background includes over 20 years of Board experience. He has also been the interim CEO of Well Services Ltd.
Mark served on the Audit Committee for Opportunity International and on the Board of Directors for St. Alexius Medical Center in Chicago. Mark began his career at Arthur Andersen and Honeywell in the U.S. and Europe. He received his MBA in IT from the University of Minnesota and his BS in Accounting from The Ohio State University.
