Cropsolution is fortunate to have attracted a group of people that has a demonstrated track record of success and a keen interest in solving the problems on the farm.  Our people have three commercial agrochemicals on the market and have helped guide companies from the start-up phase through IPO.  Furthermore, the folks at Cropsolution understand that most activities will be done better with a team of people that respect and trust each other.  Therefore, we have a culture that emphasizes the commitment we have with each other, our investors and our commercialization partners.  For more about our culture please see the Culture and Careers page.

Biochemistry
Business Development, Investor Relations and Operations
Chemistry and Biology
SAB/ Business Advisory Board
Board of Directors

Steven Breazeale , Ph.D.
Dr. Breazeale joined Cropsolution after completing a postdoctoral fellowship at Duke University, studying enzymes involved in modifying lipid A.  He received his Ph.D. in bioorganic chemistry from The Johns Hopkins University in 1999, where he studied the biosynthesis of  b-lactam antibiotics.    He graduated from the University of Washington with B.S. degrees in chemistry and biochemistry.  He is an author on 9 scientific publications.

Tedd D Elich, Ph.D.
Research Team Leader, Biochemistry Group
Prior to joining Cropsolution, Dr. Elich was Program Leader at Akkadix Corporation where he was responsible for establishing and implementing a research program aimed at identifying genes whose targeted misexpression conferred beneficial agronomic traits. Before joining Akkadix, Dr. Elich served as a Project Leader at Monsanto Company where he directed a research effort whose goal was to understand and modify fundamental aspects of soybean growth and development. Dr. Elich received his B.S. degree from University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1984 with majors in Biochemistry and Math. He received his Ph.D. in Plant Biochemistry from University of California-Davis in 1989 after which he completed postdoctoral fellowships at the USDA and the Salk Institute. Dr. Elich is author of 17 scientific publications and co-inventor on one patent.

Jodi Stewart
Jodi Stewart graduated from the University of California Santa Cruz in 2005 with Bachelor of Science degrees in Environmental Chemistry and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. Ms. Stewart completed her Chemistry degree with honors for her senior thesis entitled “HPLC of the invasive species Hypericum canariense to assess rapid evolutionary changes in defensive chemistry.”  She also received highest honors for her Biology degree.  Jodi was one of 20 national recipients of the 2005 Young Botanist of the Year Special Achievement Award from the Botanical Society of America.

Micah Gliedt
Mr. Gliedt joined the Cropsolution team in March of 2004.  Before that he was a research associate at Discovery Partners International synthesizing libraries of scaffolds as building blocks for lead optimization.  Mr. Gliedt graduated from Georgia Tech. in 2002 with his Master of Chemistry where he worked on synthesizing a 5-5’ lignin crosslink.  In 1997 Mr. Gliedt graduated from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology with a Bachelors of Science in Chemistry.

Sandra L. Volrath
Senior Research Associate
Ms. Volrath was employed for 14 years as a research scientist at the Ciba-Geigy/Novartis/Syngenta agricultural biotechnology research unit in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. Her research responsibilities included the areas of disease resistance, herbicide target validation, herbicide tolerant crop production, and the engineering of grain quality traits in transgenic maize. She was a key member of the team that invented Acuron™ herbicide tolerance technology. She is an inventor on 4 issued US patents and multiple pending patent applications, particularly related to Acuron‰ technology, and she is an author on 11 scientific publications. Ms. Volrath received a B.S. in Biology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a M.A. in Biochemistry from Duke University.

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Lawrence Daquioag
Director of Operations
Mr. Daquioag served most recently as Director of Operations for Ardent Pharmaceuticals. Prior to his appointment at Ardent, Mr. Daquioag served as head of operations, lab design, and build-out for Macronex, Artecel, Merix, Paradigm Genetics, SARCO, Biostratum, Closure Medical, Micell Technologies, Novalon Pharmaceuticals, Triangle Pharmaceuticals, ICAgen, Inspire Pharmaceuticals, and other companies. Mr. Daquioag has 20 years experience in laboratory operations, lab design and construction supervision. Prior to moving to Research Triangle Park, Mr. Daquioag was Supervisor for the Reference Immunology Lab at the Letterman Army Medical Center in California. He received his B.S degree in Clinical Science from California State University at San Francisco. Prior to getting his degree, Mr. Daquioag served in the United States Air Force.

Suzanne J. Gaus
Office Manager
Ms. Gaus’ entrance into the biotechnology industry began by joining Ciba in 1994 where she was responsible for handling materials transfer requests as well as providing contracts and licensing administrative support. She was responsible for re-designing the licensing database and filing system. She was also a member of a team performing due diligence in connection with a proposed acquisition and was involved in both pre-and post-merger organizational issues for both the Ciba/Sandoz and Novartis/Zeneca mergers. Her professional career is comprised of twelve years as a legal administrative assistant focusing on intellectual property, immigration, corporate and litigation, the last four years with the firm of Graham & James – Raleigh NC office. She has had experience in human resources, working closely with the HR group within Novartis/Syngenta as well as establishing a Employee Relations Committee within Graham & James handling a redesign of the review process, grievances as well as general personnel matters.

Tim C. Gupton
Chief Financial Officer and Assistant Treasurer
Mr. Gupton has twenty-nine years of public accounting experience and serves as a business advisor to technology companies in early stages of development and funding. Mr. Gupton is a founder and general partner of Research Triangle Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on seed and early stage investments. He is a founder and president of Research Triangle Family Officer, LLC, a company providing wealth management services for families in the Research Triangle area. He is a director of Ardent Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a private pharmaceutical company developing products for the pain and urinary incontinence markets. He is currently a co-founder and start-up chief financial officer for Alphavax, Inc., a vaccine company based on new genomic vector technology from the University of North Carolina and has served in a similar capacity for Cogent Neuroscience, Inc., Inspire Pharmaceuticals, Inc., SARCO, Inc. and Trimeris, Inc. He joined Hughes Pittman & Gupton, L.L.P. in 1992 after 19 years with KPMG. His practice is centered on entrepreneurial businesses and their founders that include owner-managed businesses and investor-financed technology companies in the Triangle. Mr. Gupton has served as the engagement partner and business advisor to private and public company clients ranging from start-up companies financed by private venture capital to multinational public companies. He has experience auditing companies in a wide range of industries including life sciences, information technology, manufacturing, wholesale distribution, construction, retirement plans, financial institutions, governmental, government contracting, mortgage banking, non-profit and real estate. Before joining Hughes Pittman & Gupton, he was previously with KPMG Peat Marwick in Fort Lauderdale, Florida for nineteen years, nine years as an audit partner. During his career at KPMG, his responsibilities included administrative partner-in-charge of the audit department, associate SEC reviewing partner, professional practice/quality control partner and director of financial services. Mr. Gupton received a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1972 and is a member of the American Institute of CPAs, the North Carolina Association of CPAs and the Florida Institute of CPAs.

Jeff Hovey
Controller
Mr. Hovey is a Certified Public Accountant with over twelve years of accounting experience, including more than three in the biotech and pharmaceutical industries. He received B.S. degrees in accounting and finance from The Ohio State University in 1990. Previously, he served as controller for an entrepreneurial company specializing in magnetic resonance imaging, where he was responsible for securing financing as well as directing the finance department.

Michelle D. Hunt
Director of Strategic Marketing; responsible for contracts and licensing matters, market analysis, opportunity assessment, and intellectual property strategy
Dr. Hunt is primarily responsible for contracts, licensing, and intellectual property matters at Cropsolution.  As a member of the business development team at Cropsolution, she interfaces and negotiates relationships with potential research and licensing partners and, as a member of the investor relations team, works with investors to consummate financing rounds for the company. Prior to joining Cropsolution, she served as Director of Contracts and Licensing for Syngenta Biotechnology, Inc. (SBI), and its predecessor entities, where she was responsible for the crop protection and seeds related transactional deal flow. Such activities included establishing in excess of 250 research related agreements with combinatorial chemistry companies, biotechnology companies, service providers and academic institutions, often in conjunction with the Crop Protection, Seeds or Pharma businesses of SBI or predecessor companies.  Furthermore, in 1997 she became a registered patent agent.  Dr. Hunt began her career in 1994 with Ciba-Geigy as a postdoctoral research associate where she studied systemic acquired resistance signal transduction using Arabidopsis as a model.  She received her Ph.D. in plant breeding from Cornell University in 1994, where she was an NSF/DOE/USDA-funded Plant Science Center Fellow.  She received B.S degrees in biology and botany in 1988, graduating with highest distinction and honors from Colorado State University.  Dr. Hunt has authored more than 10 scientific publications and given numerous scientific presentations.

Scott J. Uknes
President and Board Member; responsible for business strategy, business development and project management
Dr. Uknes was a co- founder of Paradigm Genetics [now Icoria, Inc. (ICOR)] where he served as Vice-President of Business Strategy.  In this role, Dr. Uknes determined the market opportunity for Paradigm's technology, designed and implemented value capture strategies and communicated this strategy to investors during and after Paradigm Genetics’ IPO.  Dr. Uknes served previously as the Vice President of Fungal Research where he was responsible for the design and implementation of Paradigm's fungal genomics platform. Prior to Paradigm Genetics, Inc., he managed the scientific effort aimed at understanding the mode-of-action of “plant activators” at Novartis (now Syngenta).  In this capacity, Dr. Uknes was also responsible for organizing and implementing the patent strategy for this area of research that resulted in a marketed agricultural chemical.  From 1994 to 1996, Dr. Uknes was the Research Director for the Seeds Disease Control projects at Ciba-Geigy Corp.  The team produced numerous patent filings, contracts, licenses and publications that helped establish Ciba/Novartis as a leader in novel disease resistance approaches.  Dr. Uknes was an ad-hoc member of Ciba Seeds Biotechnology Strategy Committee.  Dr. Uknes is an adjunct professor at North Carolina State University and a scientific advisory board member for Biolex, a company focused on protein expression in Lemna.  Dr. Uknes was the PI on NSF and DOE grants.   Dr. Uknes received his Ph. D. in Plant Molecular Biology from Washington University in St. Louis with Dr. David Ho and his B.S. in Honors Biology from the University of Illinois.  Dr. Uknes has authored more than 40 scholarly works, is an inventor on more than 20 patents, helped negotiate $200 million in R and D deals and has helped raise more than $70 million in public and private equity capital.

Eric R. Ward
Chief Executive Office and Board Member; responsible for management, investor relations, finance and operations
Dr. Ward served most recently as co-president of Novartis (now Syngenta) Agribusiness Biotechnology Research, where he was responsible for a staff of 270, including researchers and all administrative functions, including finance, patents, business development, public affairs, human resources, and facilities.  Simultaneously, he was head of target discovery for Novartis Crop Protection AG, where he implemented a fully integrated agricultural chemical lead discovery program based on proprietary molecular targets.  This program relied on extensive interactions with biotech firms and academic labs.  Prior to that, he was a Research Director for the Novartis herbicide business unit, during which time his team invented Acuron™ herbicide tolerance technology, developed corn and sugar beet varieties engineered with the Acuron™ gene, and built the patent strategy to protect the technology.  In 1994-5, he worked in Basel, Switzerland as a project leader for Ciba Crop Protection in the Weed Control business unit.  Dr. Ward began his career in 1988 with Ciba-Geigy as a postdoctoral associate, during which time he pioneered methods for cloning of large DNA fragments from plants.  He received his Ph.D. in plant biology from Washington University in St. Louis in 1988, where he was a graduate fellow of the National Science Foundation.  He received his B.S in biology magna cum laude from Duke University in 1982.  Dr. Ward has authored more than 65 scientific publications and is inventor on more than 20 issued patents.

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Eric Ward, Ann Sjolander, Stephanie Weatherly, Rich Anderson, Tedd Elich, Sandy Volrath, Suzi Gaus, Scott Uknes, Vivian Du, Rafe Oey, Shy-Fuh Lee, Takeo Hokama

Richard J. Anderson
Director of Chemistry
Dr. Anderson has over 25 years of agrochemical experience and has discovered two successful commercial products. His most recent appointment was Director of Chemistry for AffyAgro, a unit of Affymax Research Institute (July 1998 through July 2001). He began his formal education at the University of Minnesota, Institute of Technology where he received a Bachelors degree in Chemistry and continued his chemistry studies at Stanford receiving his Ph.D. in organic chemistry under the guidance of Dr. Eugene van Tamelen. During his doctoral studies, he began a relationship with Zoecon Corporation, an entrepreneurial venture founded by Dr. Carl Djerassi to develop novel insect control agents based on a biorational research approach. His early research efforts on insect growth regulators, insect pheromones, and pyrethroids resulted in numerous patents and scientific publications, and the discovery of the commercial insecticide tau-fluvalinate. As a section leader and assistant department head, Dr. Anderson initiated a highly successful chemical herbicide research program at Zoecon/Sandoz that led to the discovery of 10 new chemistries with developmental potential as herbicides. His discovery of the herbicidal semicarbazones that combine synergistically with auxin agonists resulted in the commercialization of diflufenzopyr. In 1990 as manager of herbicide research, he assumed responsibility for all Sandoz Agro chemical and formulation herbicide research and greenhouse biological evaluation in North America. Following the Novartis merger in 1997, Dr. Anderson accomplished the successful technology transfer of several herbicide projects to the Basel research group and served as assistant to the Director of Research. He is an inventor on 46 issued patents and is an author on 27 scientific publications.

Patricia Arakaki
Research Associate - Biologist
From 1998 through July of 2001, Ms. Arakaki worked at AffyAgro developing protocols for in vivo insecticidal, herbicidal and fungicidal assays using 96-well technology and in vitro assays using 864-well technology. Prior to that she worked at Collagen Corporation and Celtrix developing protocols for immunohistochemical and autoradiographic stains on paraffin and frozen sections of human and animal tissue to characterize in situ reactions. Ms. Arakaki received a Bachelors of Science degree in Dietetics and Home Economics from the University of California at Davis, a Masters degree in Pubic Health Nutrition from the University of Hawaii and a Biotechnology Certificate from De Anza College. In addition to her professional activities, she is also self-employed as part owner and proprietor of a 12-acre persimmon and chestnut farm.

Vivian Du
Research Associate - Chemist
From July 2000 through June 2001, Ms. Du was a research assistant at AffyAgro where she conducted multiple-step syntheses of novel agrochemical molecules, using solid-phase and solution-phase methods. One of her key responsibilities was the preparation of biologically active compounds for advanced evaluation. Prior to her employment at AffyAgro, Ms. Du performed small molecule and peptide syntheses as well as analytical analyses at RiboGene and SynPep Corporation. Ms. Du received her Bachelors of Science degree in Biochemistry from San Francisco State University in 1996.

Shy-Fuh Lee, Ph.D.
Distinguished Scientist
Dr. Lee has a record of accomplishments in agrochemical discovery including the discovery and synthesis of over 12 compounds that advanced to late stages of product development and the discovery of two new classes of p-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase inhibitors, one of which has produced a commercial rice herbicide, benzobicyclon. He most recently was a senior scientist at AffyAgro, designing and conducting the syntheses of encoded combinatorial chemical libraries for bead-based screening on agronomic targets. Dr. Lee graduated with a B.S. in chemistry from the National Taiwan Normal University and received his Ph.D. in chemistry at the University of New Brunswick under the direction of Dr. K. Wiesner. After postdoctoral appointments in the laboratories of Dr. A. Ian Scott at Yale University and Dr. Carl Djerassi at Stanford University, he began his professional career at Merck Frosst Laboratories in Montreal. In 1979, he joined Zoecon Corporation where he became a key member of a newly established herbicide discovery program. Several compounds that he discovered were licensed to Stauffer Chemical Company, one of which (Trophy‘) reached late stage development. Throughout his career at Novartis, he consistently delivered compounds with developmental potential. His prolific record of discovery is reflected in his 44 issued patents and 13 scientific publications. In 1991, Dr. Lee received the first Lumiere Award of the Sandoz Research Division for his research excellence.

Rafael J. Oey
Research Biologist
Mr. Oey has worked for six years in the field of crop protection science. Mr. Oey’s most recent appointment was as a research associate at AffyAgro where he established a high throughput in vivo/in vitro biological screening program by adapting pharmaceutical research methods to agrochemical discovery. He was a member of the Research Management Committee that oversaw and determined the direction of a collaborative research and development project with the DuPont Agricultural Research Group. Prior to his work at AffyAgro, Mr. Oey was an associate scientist at the Novartis Crop Protection facility in Palo Alto working in the insect biochemistry group developing and implementing micro-scale assays in collaboration with the Scripps Research Institute. Mr. Oey received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1995 from the University of California at Santa Cruz in Biology and Legal Studies, and completed paralegal certification in June of 1998 from the Santa Clara University School of Law.

Chris Palmer
Principal Research Chemist
Dr. Palmer received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry in 1981, researching insecticidal natural products under the guidance of Professor Leslie Crombie at the University of Nottingham in England. His doctoral research work was licensed to the Animal Health Division of Wellcome. In 1982, after a postdoctoral position researching cannabis chemistry, he joined Professor John Casida’s group in the Pesticide Chemistry and Toxicology Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley, initially as a post doctoral researcher, then in 1985 as a specialist on the faculty. His discoveries including a new class of insecticides acting at the GABA-gated chloride channel were licensed to Wellcome, Roussel-Uclaf and Dupont. In 1991, he joined Ishihara Sangyo Kaisha (ISK), as team leader for insecticide discovery at their research facility in Mountain View, California. Later in 1994, Dr. Palmer was appointed group leader of a new agrochemical discovery group at ISK’s research facility in Concord, Ohio and was then based in ISK’s main research labs in Kusatsu, Japan where he spent 8 years. During this time he worked mainly in the HPPD and PPOI herbicides area and new insecticide discovery based on natural products. Upon returning to the USA, he joined Cropsolution and was appointed Professor of Chemistry at Ohlone College. He is an inventor on 25 issued patents and an author on 47 scientific publications

Takeo Hokama
Ph.D. Research Chemist
Dr. Hokama has worked for more than 25 years in crop protection chemistry. Dr. Hokama worked previously at AffyAgro as a synthesis chemist. Prior to that Dr. Hokama worked for 12 years for Sandoz (Novartis) as a Principal or Senior Scientist. Dr. Hokama got his start in the Agrochemical chemistry at Velsicol Chemical Corporation where he worked on both insecticide and herbicide synthesis as a Group Leader. Dr. Hokama also worked at Koppers Company and recieved his M.S. and Ph.D. at Purdue University working with Dr. G.B.Bachman. Dr Hokama is an inventor or co-inventor on more than 35 patents.

Ann Sjolander
Analytical Chemist
Ms. Sjolander has worked for more than 20 years as an analytical chemist. Most recently, Ms. Sjolander worked as Technical Services Group Leader at DSM Pharmaceuticals where she worked with various groups to perform process research impurity profiling and assay development. Prior to DSM, Ms. Sjolander worked at Novartis Crop Protection (Sandoz) as a Senior Scientist performing GC/MS and LC/MS, and supervising Chromatography Services for the Chemistry, Biology, and Biochemistry Research Groups. This work included small molecule and natural product structural determination, methods development, and report writing for regulatory submission. Before Novartis, Ms. Sjolander worked at Dellavalle Laboratories and Twinning Laboratories. Ms. Sjolander received a BA in Microbiology from California State University at Fresno.

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From left to right: Jurek Paszkowski, Scott Uknes, Shy-Fuh Lee, Rich Anderson, Tim Gupton (back), Eric Ward (front), Sandy Volrath, Doug Gooding (Aurora Funds), Tedd Elich, Bruce Eaton, Jeff Dangl, Dick Fuelner, Daniel Bellus (back), Michelle Hunt (front), Denny Ciarlante, Stephanie Weatherly, Dan Nieulandt, Rafe Oey (front) John Rabby (back) and Vince Morton.

Jeff Dangl, Ph.D.
Dr. Dangl is currently the John N. Couch Professor in the Biology Department of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The focus of his research and teaching endeavors are the study of the processes of information flow between plants and plant pathogens. Through his contributions to research, membership on editorial boards (including the journal Cell) and expert panels, Dr. Dangl has played a significant international role in the advancement of Arabidopsis thaliana as a model organism for plant biology research. After completing his Ph.D. on segmental flexibility of genetically engineered monoclonal antibodies at Stanford University in 1986, Dr. Dangl moved into the area of plant defense at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding. He is a founding member of the Max Delbrueck Laboratory in Cologne, Germany where he and his group pioneered the use of A. thaliana to study the genetics of plant resistance to bacterial pathogens. His group isolated the RPM1 gene, one of the first cloned plant resistance genes that enabled the identification of the nucleotide binding site–leucine rich repeat (NBS-LRR) proteins as components of the principal pathogen detection system in plants. Since moving to North Carolina in 1996, Dr. Dangl has continued to use a set of genetic, cell biology and genomics approaches to define and unravel both A. thaliana disease resistance networks and the biology of the bacterial plant pathogen Pseudomonas syringae. More recently, his lab has uncovered the process by which bacterial effector molecules, which are delivered to plant cells by specialized bacterial transporters, are acted upon by host fatty acid acylation enzymes for targeting to the plasma membrane. The biological function of these effector molecules in plant disease is currently a focal point in the study of plant-pathogen interactions.

Bruce Eaton, Ph.D.
Bruce Eaton is a Professor of Chemistry at North Carolina State University. Dr. Eaton was Vice President of Chemistry at NeXstar Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (1994-1999) where he directed the efforts of over 50 scientists and managed the group responsible for the production of the first successful aptamer IND, NX1838, for age-related macular degeneration. In 1998, he led the business development efforts that resulted in the spinout of the chemistry company Proligo LLC, which led to NeXstar achieving profitability that year. Also during his years at NeXstar Pharmaceuticals, Dr. Eaton was a Professor of Chemistry at Washington State University, a position he held there since 1989. Dr. Eaton is named as inventor on more than 25 issued patents and has authored more than 50 peer-reviewed publications and scientific meeting presentations. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees from the University of Oregon in 1980 and 1981 respectively, and his Ph.D. from the University of California,
Berkeley in 1986.

H. Vincent Morton, Ph.D.
Dr. Morton currently is President of Viva Inc., an agricultural consulting firm, and a Board Member of AgriSol. Prior to these responsibilities Dr. Morton worked at Ciba-Geigy for 30 years. Most recently he was the New Products Manager for the Seed Treatment and Fungicides division of Ciba. During his time at Ciba-Geigy he is best known as the father of Ridomil, a fungicide with peak sales of >$400 million per year. Dr. Morton was involved in all of the major activities required to develop a fungicide for the market, including registration, long-range planning, sales training, advertising, market assessment, and basic R and D. In these various capacities, Dr. Morton made substantial contributions to the development of 12 new fungicides that in total account for more than 22% of the US market. Dr. Morton also worked for ICI in Britain. Dr. Morton received the Excellence in Industry Award in 1998 from the American Phytopathological Society for his contributions in Industry and his service as a mentor, committee member and role model. Dr. Morton received his M.S. and Ph. D. from the University of Florida and his B.S. from University of Natal. Dr. Morton has made extensive contributions to the field of plant/pest interactions via patents, scientific publications and presentations.

Dan Nieuwlandt, Ph.D.
Dan Nieuwlandt has been involved in the field of in vitro evolution (SELEX and Evolutionary Chemistry) for over 12 years.  Dr. Nieuwlandt is currently a Senior Scientist with SomaLogic, Inc., a Boulder, Colorado company that utilizes in vitro evolution and its unique aptamer array and bioinformatics capabilities to discover disease-specific biomarkers and protein signatures.  Prior to his SomaLogic appointment, he served as Vice President, Biology, at Invenux, Inc. (2000-3), where he directed all biology efforts, including drug target evaluation and the development of new in vitro evolution methodologies for the company’s Evolutionary Chemistry (EC) technology.  During his tenure at Invenux, Dr. Nieuwlandt was largely responsible for transferring the EC technology (biochemistry components) to Cropsolution, Inc.  Prior to his Invenux position, he was employed by Nexstar Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (1994-9), where he succeeded in RNA aptamer in vitro evolution efforts directed at numerous disease-diagnostic targets, and was an Associate Director in the Evolutionary Chemistry group where he was an integral member of the team that developed the EC technology.  Dr. Nieuwlandt completed a postdoctoral fellowship, with a focus on in vitro evolution methodologies (when the field was in its infancy), in the laboratory of Dr. Larry Gold at the University of Colorado (1992-4).  He received his Ph.D. and M.S. degrees in microbiology from The Ohio State University (catalytic RNA research) and Iowa State University (Staphylococcus aureus genetics), respectively, and his B.A. in biology from California State University, Fullerton.

Jerzy Paszkowski, Ph.D.
Prof. Paszkowski is a senior group leader at the Friedrich Miescher Institute (FMI) in Basel, Switzerland. His research interests are in the area of plant gene recombination and silencing. His numerous research accomplishments include the first successful transformation of plant cells with naked DNA, the first demonstration of gene targeting in plants, and the identification of genes controlling transcriptional silencing in plants. He received his Ph.D. from the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, and was a Senior Associate and Oberassistent at the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule in Zürich before assuming his duties at the FMI. Prof. Paszkowski has authored more than 70 scientific publications and is an inventor on numerous patents.

John C. Rabby
Former Group Vice President-North America for BASF Corporation. In this role Mr. Rabby Led a $1.3 billion, 1700 person chemical company increasing profitability as measured by EBITDA by more than 40%. Prior to this Mr. Rabby held various sales, marketing and commercial development positions within American Cyanamid. Mr. Rabby has a Masters in Pest Management and a BS in Entomology from Mississippi State University. Mr. Rabby has more than 20 years of agrochemical business experience.

Ulrich Schirmer, Ph.D.
Former Senior Vice President for BASF where he was responsible for the discovery and development of crop-protection chemicals. Prior to that Dr. Schirmer worked in various research and marketing positions at BASF. Dr. Schrimer was part of the team that started the plant biotechnology group within BASF in 1997 and was part of the integration team for the American Cyanamid acquisition. Dr. Schirmer was a board member for Wirtschaftsverbund Pflanzengenomforschung GABI e.V. Dr. Schirmer recieved his Ph.D. at the University of Stuttgart and did post doctoral work at the University of Paris-Orsay. He has more than 20 years experience in the agrochemical business.

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Ambassador Clayton Yeutter
Chairman
Ambassador Yeutter has a long distinguished career engaging in issues pertaining to agriculture, food and international trade. He was named Secretary of Agriculture under the Bush administration in 1989. In that post, he steered the 1990 Farm Bill through Congress, laying the groundwork for a far more market-oriented policy structure in American agriculture. In 1991, he was elected Republican National Chairman and a year later President Bush persuaded him to return to the administration in a Cabinet-level post as Counselor to the President. He served as U.S. Trade Representative from 1985-1988 and while there led the American team in negotiating the historic U.S.-Canada Free Trade Agreement, the precursor to NAFTA. He also helped launch the most ambitious trade negotiation in history, the 100-nation Uruguay Round, which culminated in the creation of the World Trade Organization. While U.S. Trade Representative, Ambassador Yeutter broadened the US trade agenda to encompass for the first time serious global negotiations in services, intellectual property and agriculture. From 1978 through 1985, he served as President and CEO of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. His tenure there was marked by innovation and growth that contributed to the "Merc's" evolution into one of the largest financial institutions in the world. Earlier in his career, Ambassador Yeutter held two Assistant Secretary of Agriculture posts under the Nixon administration and then served as Deputy Special Trade Representative under President Ford. He had previously been the director of one of the world's largest agriculture technical assistance programs in Colombia, South America, after having served as Chief of Staff to the Governor of Nebraska. Ambassador Yeutter earned his J.D. and Ph.D. in agricultural economics from University of Nebraska, both with highest academic honors, while simultaneously managing the central Nebraska farm that he still owns. He presently is Of Counsel to Hogan & Hartson in Washington, D.C., practicing in the international trade, food and agriculture areas. He has served or presently serves on the boards of ConAgra, Caterpillar, Farmers Insurance Company, FMC, Mycogen,Oppenheimer Funds, Texas Instruments, Weyerhaeuser and Zurich Financial Services.

Jonathan Malkin
Jonathan Malkin is a founder and Managing General Partner of ATP Capital LP. He has served in this capacity, as well as Managing Director of ATP Management Group LLC since its formation in 1997. ATP Capital is a $70,000,000 private equity fund dedicated to the Life Sciences with portfolio activities ranging from pharmaceuticals to forestry biotechnology. Mr. Malkin serves in the Boards of Directors of several private companies in this field. In addition, he is Managing Member of Malkin & Co. LLC an investment company focused on biotechnology. Prior to ATP, he was active for more than a decade as an investor and investment banker in the USA and in Europe. He received a B.A. in Government from Pomona College and a Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School.

Douglas Gooding
Mr. Gooding is a Venture Partner at the Aurora Funds and also serves as President of Regado Biosciences, an Aurora’s portfolio company.  As a Venture Partner for Aurora, he works primarily with Aurora's life science portfolio, specifically in the areas of biotechnology, drug discovery and development.  Mr. Gooding currently services on the Boards of both Cropsolution and Metabolon. Prior to joining Aurora in 2001, he was a Director of Business Development at Paradigm Genetics (now Icoria, Inc.: ICOR). Mr. Gooding also spent four years at Incyte Pharmaceuticals (INCY), where he was the manager of the cDNA Library Construction Group. In addition, he worked as a Research Associate at Stratagene Cloning Systems in La Jolla, California.  Mr. Gooding received a Bachelor of Arts in Biology, with a minor in Chemistry, from the University of San Diego and an MBA from the Kenan-Flagler Business School in Chapel Hill, NC

Eric Ward

Scott Uknes