A SHORT FILM

WELCOME & INTRODUCTION

Roy Geronemus, MD

NYSCF Chairman of the Board

Paul Goldberger

NYSCF Board Member

Valentina Fossati, PhD

NYSCF Senior Research Investigator

Daniel Paull, PhD

NYSCF Senior Vice President, Discovery & Platform Development A CONVERSATION

The Promise of Stem Cell Research and the Future of Medicine

Derrick Rossi, PhD

NYSCF Interim CEO &

Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD

Acting Science Advisor to the President

Derrick Rossi, PhD

Derrick Rossi, NYSCF Interim CEO, is a serial biotech entrepreneur and stem cell scientist. His efforts developing cutting-edge technologies and novel therapeutic strategies are at the forefront of regenerative medicine and biotechnology.

Dr. Rossi earned his BSc and MSc from University of Toronto, and his PhD from the University of Helsinki, followed by post-doctoral training at Stanford University. He was an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital, where he led an academic team working on stem cell biology and regenerative medicine, including how aging of the stem cell compartment of hematopoietic stem cells contributes to disease pathogenesis and aging-associated hematopoietic decline. Dr. Rossi was also a principal faculty member of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute from 2008 until his retirement from Harvard.

Discoveries made in Dr. Rossi’s lab have led to the formation of several biotechnology companies. Dr. Rossi co-founded Moderna, whose COVID-19 vaccine is being deployed around the world, as well as several other biotech companies, including Intellia Therapeutics, Magenta Therapeutics, Stelexis Therapeutics, and Convelo Therapeutics. Since September 2022, he has been Interim CEO of NYSCF.

TIME magazine cited Dr. Rossi’s discovery of modifiedmRNA reprogramming as one of the top ten medical breakthroughs of 2010. TIME magazine also named Dr. Rossi as one of the “People Who Mattered” in 2010, and as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the world (TIME 100) in 2011.

Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD

Francis S. Collins, currently serves as the Special Advisor to President Biden for Special Projects. In this role, he is leading a bold program to help eliminate Hepatitis C in the United States. Dr. Collins also maintains his longstanding position as a Senior Investigator in the intramural program of the National Human Genome Research Institute, pursuing genomics research on type 2 diabetes and a rare disorder of premature aging called progeria.

Dr. Collins previously served as the 16th Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), appointed by President Barack Obama and confirmed by the Senate in 2009. In 2017, President Donald Trump asked Dr. Collins to continue to serve as the NIH Director. President Joe Biden did the same in 2021. For those 12 years, serving an unprecedented three administrations, Dr. Collins oversaw the work of the largest supporter of biomedical research in the world, spanning the spectrum from basic to clinical research. Dr. Collins stepped down as Director on December 19, 2021.

Dr. Collins is a physician-geneticist noted for his landmark discoveries of disease genes and his previous leadership of the international Human Genome Project, which culminated in April 2003 with the completion of a finished sequence of the human DNA instruction book. He served as director of the National Human Genome Research Institute at NIH from 1993-2008.

Dr. Collins is an elected member of both the National Academy of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences, was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in November 2007, and received the National Medal of Science in 2009. In 2020, he was elected as a Foreign Member of the Royal Society (UK) and was also named the 50th winner of the Templeton Prize, which celebrates scientific and spiritual curiosity.