About Us

Daniel J. Mandell, PhD is CEO and Co-Founder of GRO Biosciences. A scientist and entrepreneur, Dr. Mandell is a leading expert in synthetic biology and protein engineering. Together with Dr. George Church, he leveraged genomically recoded organisms (GROs) to produce the first proteins with stability and function dependent on non-standard amino acids. Dr. Mandell completed his research fellowship in genetics at Harvard Medical School where he was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow of the Life Sciences Research Foundation. Dr. Mandell completed his PhD at University of California, San Francisco, his MSc at University of Edinburgh, and his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems at Stanford University. Dr. Mandell currently serves as a member of the BIO (Biotechnology Innovation Organization) Early-Stage Advisory Council and as a mentor for the iGEM and Nucleate programs. Prior to his role at GRObio, Dr. Mandell served as a consultant with Warp Drive Bio.

Dr. Gregg developed technologies for multiplexed genome engineering in microbial systems under Dr. George Church and brings leading expertise in genome design, microbial fermentation, and glycobiology of the immune system. Dr. Gregg completed his research fellowship at Harvard University, his PhD in Biomedical Sciences at University of California, San Diego, and his undergraduate work in Biomedical Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Gregg also led the strain engineering and synthetic biology efforts at GreenLight Biosciences prior to joining GRObio as Chief Science Officer.

Mr. Stewart, a veteran industry executive, has worked extensively in business and corporate development in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical space for more than 20 years. He has played an integral strategic role in scaling platform biotechnology companies from early stages through FDA-approval and product launch. Mr. Stewart served most recently as Chief Business Officer of Ribon Therapeutics. Prior to his role at Ribon he served as President and CEO of Commense, Inc., Chief Business Officer of Crescendo Biologics, and spent many years with Merrimack Pharmaceuticals in various roles, including SVP of Business Development and Head of Commercial. Mr. Stewart received his MBA from Cornell University.

Precillia is a deeply experienced practitioner of human resources, organizational effectiveness, organizational design and change management. She has worked in the start-up, biotechnology and pharmaceutical spaces. Precillia has worked with clients of all sizes in the therapeutics space, including Gemini Therapeutics, where she served as Chief People Officer. Precillia also worked for Liberty Mutual Insurance as the Vice President of Organizational Effectiveness (OE), and Strategy & Planning for the HR function (Talent & Enterprise Services) – a 1,400 employee organization serving over 50,000 employees globally. Precillia holds a Foundations of Coaching Certificate in Leadership Coaching from Case Western Reserve University, an MBA from the F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business at Babson University, and a BA in International Relations and French from American University.

Dror Berman, is a Founding Partner at Innovation Endeavors. Mr. Berman invests in early-stage startups that are driving exponential rates of change in their industries. Mr. Berman has invested in over 100 different companies from Seed through Series B. Mr. Berman earned an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business and a BS in Computer Science from Ben-Gurion University.

Dr. Beutel is an expert in novel therapeutics and platform research, business development, and company creation. He is focused on strategy, vision, team building and value creation at the interface of science and business, particularly for seed through Series A stage biotech. Dr. Beutel received his PhD in Molecular Biology from University of Wisconsin- Madison. In addition to leadership roles at Abbott and Merck, he has had several different C-level roles in multiple biotech companies including founding COO and Chief Business & Strategy Officer at Dewpoint Therapeutics. Dr. Beutel now serves as Venture Partner with Qiming Venture Partners USA.

Ms. Rakhshita Dhar is Senior Director of Venture Investments Health at Leaps by Bayer. Ms. Dhar received her Undergraduate degree in Biochemistry from Mumbai University and her Master’s in Molecular Biology from Georgetown University. Ms. Dhar’s past leadership experience include Director of Business Development at Roche Pharmaceuticals where she led collaborations with Dyno Therapeutics and Rheos Biosciences. She also spent several years at MassBio developing an accelerator program for life-science start-ups.

Dr. Gregg developed technologies for multiplexed genome engineering in microbial systems under Dr. George Church and brings leading expertise in genome design, microbial fermentation, and glycobiology of the immune system. Dr. Gregg completed his research fellowship at Harvard University, his PhD in Biomedical Sciences at University of California, San Diego, and his undergraduate work in Biomedical Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Gregg also led the strain engineering and synthetic biology efforts at GreenLight Biosciences prior to joining GRObio as Chief Science Officer.

Dr. Mandell, a scientist and entrepreneur, is a leading expert in synthetic biology, protein engineering, artificial intelligence, and biological and medical informatics. Together with Dr. George Church, he leveraged GROs to produce the first proteins with stability and function dependent on non-standard amino acids. Dr. Mandell completed his research fellowship in genetics at Harvard Medical School where he was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow of the Life Sciences Research Foundation. Dr. Mandell completed his PhD at University of California, San Francisco, his MSc at University of Edinburgh, and his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University. Dr. Mandell currently serves as a member of BIO’s (Biotechnology Innovation Organization) Early-Stage Advisory Council. Prior to his role at GRObio, Dr. Mandell served as a consultant with WarpDrive Bio.

Geoffrey W. Smith is the Founder and Managing Partner of Digitalis Ventures, a venture capital firm that partners with entrepreneurs, inventors, and scientists across all stages of venture investing to develop technology-driven solutions to complex problems in health. Geoff serves as a Trustee of The Jackson Laboratory where he is a member of the Executive Committee and Chair of the Finance Committee. He is also a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston. Geoff also serves as the Chair of the Bard Early College Board of Governors. Previously, Geoff was the founding Director of the Mount Sinai Institute of Technology and a Professor in the Department of Population Health Science and Policy at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Geoff received a B.A. (with honors) from Williams College and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Dr. Church is a synthetic biologist with foundational contributions to genome sequencing, DNA synthesis, multiplex accurate genome editing (MAGE) and protein engineering. Dr. Church is Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School, Director of Wyss Inst. SynBio platform, and recipient of awards like Bower, Time100, NAS, NAE. Dr. Church led the development of genomically recoded organisms (GROs) at the core of the GRO Biosciences platform, and leads the company’s Scientific Advisory Board.

Dr. Ellington is the Fraser Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Texas at Austin and is a respected expert in using evolutionary techniques to engineer biopolymers and cells. Dr. Ellington led the development of key protein translational machinery to incorporate non-standard amino acids into proteins using GROs. Dr. Ellington is a GRObio co-founder and serves on the company’s Scientific Advisory Board.

Dr. Paulk is an Assistant Professor of AAV Gene Therapy at the University of California San Francisco, Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics. Her research focuses on pioneering next-generation AAV gene delivery and gene editing platforms. She has developed therapies for gene repair and gene transfer for numerous rare diseases and cancer and has applied high-throughput comparative proteomic and epigenomic approaches to address challenges in fundamental AAV biology. Dr. Paulk earned her B.S. in Medical Microbiology from Central Washington University, her PhD in Viral Gene Therapy from Oregon Health and Science University and completed her Postdoctoral Fellowship in Human Gene Therapy at Stanford University.

Dr. Lodie now serves as Chief Scientific Officer at Quell Therapeutics, and was previously Chief Scientific Officer at Gamida Cell, Ltd. Prior she held senior leadership roles at Blue Rock Therapeutics, Syros Pharma, and Sanofi/Genzyme where she led immunology efforts from discovery through early clinical development. Dr. Lodie provides scientific, early clinical translation, and commercialization expertise for GRObio’s ProGly™ technology.

Dr. Kaarsholm has 21 years of experience at Novo Nordisk leading development and commercialization of metabolic therapeutics. He has delivered several key metabolic disease therapeutics serving in senior leadership roles in protein engineering. Dr. Kaarsholm provides scientific and commercialization expertise for GRObio’s DuraLogic™ technology.

Ms. Howson is a highly experienced business development executive and consultant with more than 30 years of service in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. Ms. Howson currently serves on the board of directors of MEI Pharma, Inc. and Immunic, Inc. Between 2009 and 2019 she has also served on the boards of various life sciences companies. Ms. Howson also served as executive vice president, corporate business development at Lexicon Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a public biotech company. Prior to joining Lexicon, Ms. Howson served as senior vice president, corporate and business development at Bristol-Myers Squibb and SmithKline Beecham PLC. Ms. Howson holds an MBA from Columbia University, an M.S. from City University of New York and a B.S. in chemical engineering from the Technion, Israel.

Arthur Hiller is a Boston-based biopharma executive. Over the last decade, he has been CEO of two early stage companies in the areas of drug discovery and cardiovascular medical devices. He currently provides consulting and business advisory support, and serves in part-time senior executive operating and mentoring roles for a wide range of start-up and early stage companies in the Boston area. His career spans more than 35 years of experience across a wide range of functional areas and sectors of the life sciences and healthcare technology industry, where he has held executive positions in general management, marketing, sales, sales management, and business development at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Merck and Co, and two other large, multinational pharmaceutical companies.

Dr. Peattie is veteran life science entrepreneur who currently serves as Managing Partner at SV Bio Ventures. Dr. Peattie has served in senior leadership roles at Valo Health, GlaxoSmithKline, and she served as Director of Business Development in the Office of Technology Development at Harvard University. Previously, Dr. Peattie maintained her own biotechnology consulting firm, Pleiades Advisors, and she also held executive scientific, strategy and planning positions at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and at Valeo Medical, Inc., of which she was a co-founder. Dr. Peattie holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a PhD in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology from Harvard University. She was also a post-doctoral fellow at Stanford University and received her BA in Chemistry from Hollins University.  

Dr. Roberts currently serves as CEO of Civetta Therapeutics. He is an accomplished R&D executive with expertise in building companies focused on the discovery and clinical development of innovative new therapeutics. Dr. Roberts has a track record of advancing highly novel targets, biology and pharmacological approaches through to development candidates, into first in human clinical studies and successful clinical proof of concept. Dr. Roberts has experience in startups, small biotech and Big Pharma and he has a proven track record in corporate and business development in/out licensing, mergers and acquisitions, and public financings. Dr. Roberts holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry from University of California, Riverside, and completed his post-doctoral work at University of Bern in Organic Chemistry and Chemical Biology.