Progress, Potential, and Possibilities Podcast / Show

Send us a textJulie Lenzer is the Chief Innovation Officer of the Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute ( ARMI - https://www.armiusa.org ) and BioFabUSA ( https://www.armiusa.org/biofabusa ). Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute (ARMI), is one of 14 institutes of the Manufacturing USA network and is a member-driven, non-profit organization, whose mission is to make practical the large-scale manufacturing of engineered tissues and tissue-related technologies. BioFabUSA, created by ARMI, was established to lead the charge in large-scale manufacturing of engineered tissues and regenerative medicine research, turning foundational breakthroughs in the manufacture of engineered tissues and tissue-related technologies into life-changing possibilities for everyone. Prior to this role, Julie served as Commissioner of the Maryland Economic Development Commission, as well as Chief Innovation Officer at University of Maryland (UMD) fostering and supporting UMD’s innovation, entrepreneurship, and technology commercialization enterprise, including the development of the UMD’s Research Park, the Discovery District, and the Greater College Park initiative. She was also involved in promoting and facilitating university-wide collaboration to launch startup ventures based upon University intellectual property, as well as providing support for entrepreneurs and small business across the state through Mixed/Augmented/Virtual Reality Innovation Center (MAVRIC), the Maryland Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and the TechPort incubator in St. Mary’s County. Prior to that role, Julie lead the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE) within the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Economic Development Administration (EDA) where she drove programs and policies that support innovative economic development such as innovation-based entrepreneurship and regional innovation clusters. Prior to that appointment, Julie was the Executive Director of the Maryland Center for Entrepreneurship (MCE), the co-chair of Startup, as well as co-founder and former CEO of the Path Forward Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a non-profit that helped women expand economic opportunity by starting and building growth-oriented businesses using technology transfer. Julie has an undergraduate degree in Computer Science from Texas A&M and a Masters in Machine Learning from University of Maryland.Support the show

Send us a textDr. Jarah Meador, Ph.D. is Director, Open Innovation Programs, (Challenge.Gov - https://www.challenge.gov & CitizenScience.Gov - https://www.citizenscience.gov), at the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA - https://www.gsa.gov ). The GSA is an independent agency of the United States government established in 1949 to help manage and support the basic functioning of various federal agencies, supplying products and communications for U.S. government offices, providing transportation and office space to federal employees, and developing government-wide cost-minimizing policies and other management tasks. The GSA employs about 12,000 federal workers. It has an annual operating budget of roughly $33 billion and oversees $66 billion of procurement annually. It contributes to the management of about $500 billion in U.S. federal property, divided chiefly among 8,700 owned and leased buildings and a 215,000 vehicle motor pool. Among the real estate assets it manages are the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center in Washington, D.C., which is the largest U.S. federal building after the Pentagon. Dr. Meador leads the crowdsourcing, citizen science and prize competition open innovation portfolio at GSA that includes Challenge.Gov and CitizenScience.gov. Previously, she led the innovation sourcing program at the Department of Veterans Affairs Center for Innovation and this portfolio included prize competitions, broad agency announcements, and pay for success/social impact financing. The AAAS Science and Policy Technology Fellowship brought her to the federal government at the U.S. Agency for International Development ten years ago where she led a large-scale desalination technology development prize competition. Dr. Meador earned a Master's degree in Biology from Texas State University, a Ph.D. in Cancer Biology at the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences, and is an Air Force Veteran.Support the show

Send us a textAram Kradjian is Director, Research & Innovation, at Jaguar Land Rover ( https://www.jaguarlandrover.com/innovation ), where he is focused on heading the global research department, spearheading cutting edge research (collaborating with the tech industry, government, regulators and academia), as well as product design, innovation, and strategy, helping to drive the latest technologies and innovations into their products and services. Aram also serves as a Visiting Professor in Technology Innovation at King's College London. Aram has a B.Eng, Mechanical Engineering, American University of Beirut; an M.Sc., Production Systems Engineering, RWTH Aachen University, and an MBA, General Management, INSEAD.Support the show

Send us a textDr. Amy Proal, Ph.D. serves as President & CEO of the PolyBio Research Foundation (https://polybio.org/), and Chief Scientific Officer of the Long Covid Research Initiative (LCRI - https://lc19.org/). In her work with PolyBio Research Foundation and the LCRI, Dr. Proal conceptualizes and coordinates large-scale collaborative research projects among research teams studying infection-associated chronic conditions such as Long Covid, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) and Long Lyme. Dr. Proal has written multiple review articles that delineate core biological drivers of both the Long Covid and ME/CFS disease processes. She is a regular speaker at infection-associated chronic disease conferences including IACFS/ME, Lyme Mind and The International Congress on Autoimmunity. Dr. Proal holds a Bachelors of Science in biology from Georgetown University and a Ph.D. in microbiology from Murdoch University in Australia. Her work examines the molecular mechanisms by which viral, bacterial, and fungal pathogens dysregulate human gene expression, immunity, and metabolism, and how dysbiosis of the human microbiome, and/or the human virome, can contribute to chronic inflammatory disease processes. As a member of the research team at Autoimmunity Research Foundation, Dr. Proal has authored papers and written book chapters for organizations like the J. Craig Venter Institute and The Autoimmunity Network, and lectured at the NIH and numerous USA/international conferences.Support the show

Send us a textDr. Sarita A. Mohanty, MD, MPH, MBA (https://www.thescanfoundation.org/about/board-of-directors/sarita-a-mohanty/), serves as the President and Chief Executive Officer of The SCAN Foundation, one of the largest foundations in the United States focused on improving the quality of health and life for older adults. Its mission is to advance a coordinated and easily navigated system of high-quality services for older adults that preserve dignity and independence. The SCAN Foundation was created as an independent charitable organization in April 2008 through a $205 Million one-time contribution from the not-for-profit SCAN Health Plan, a not-for-profit, Medicare Advantage based in Long Beach, California. Previously, Dr. Mohanty served as the Vice President of Care Coordination for Medicaid and Vulnerable Populations at Kaiser Permanente; Assistant Professor of Medicine at USC; Chief Medical Officer of COPE Health Solutions, a health care management consulting company; and Senior Medical Director at L.A. Care, the largest U.S. public health plan. Dr. Mohanty completed her Internal Medicine residency at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and research fellowship at Harvard Medical School. She earned her MD from Boston University, MPH from Harvard University, and MBA from UCLA. She completed undergraduate work at UC Berkeley. She currently is an Associate Professor at the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine and is a practicing internal medicine physician with Kaiser Permanente.Support the show

Send us a textDr. Ava Cadell, Ph.D., Ed.D (https://www.avacadell.com/) is an actress, an accomplished author of ten books, a producer, a therapist and a global speaker on wide range of issues of human sexuality, as well as founder of Loveology University (https://www.loveuniv.com/) and the personal brand "Sexual Empowerment". Dr. Cadell earned a doctorate in human behavior from Newport University (CA) and a doctorate of education in human sexuality from the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality in San Francisco. She is also a certified hypnotherapist, certified American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists (AASECT) sex counselor, on the advisory board of the American College of Sexologists International, hosts a popular sex news blog at www.Sexpert.com and is a continuing education provider for the California Board of Behavioral Sciences and California Board of Nursing. Through her private practice in L.A., Dr. Cadell counsels some of Hollywood's elite on personal issues that range from anger management, fear of intimacy, communication problems, performance anxiety, infidelity, love and sex addiction, lack of desire, power struggles to parental concerns. A highly sought after speaker, Dr. Cadell has traveled to four continents, motivating Fortune 500 business people, religious organizations, medical institutes, women's groups and college students to embrace the power of love and create magical relationships. Dr. Cadell's filmography is extensive with appearances in movies like Commando, History of the World, Part 1, Smokey and the Bandit Part 3, as well as having appeared on hundreds of TV shows including The Doctors, LA Shrinks, Kendra on Top, Cathouse: The Series, as well as a variety of programs for MTV, VH1, Discovery, Lifetime, TLC, "E" and A&E. Dr. Cadell recently opened a 45-Acre Loveology Retreat ( https://www.loveologyretreat.com/ ); a visually stunning and awe-inspiring “Magical Property” in Maricopa, CA, about a two hour drive north of Los Angeles, whose activities include Yoga & Meditation, Hiking, Holistic Services, Stargazing, Filming & Photo Locations, and Corporate Team Building.Support the show

Send us a textProfessor Dr. Andrea B. Maier, MD, Ph.D., is the Oon Chiew Seng Professor in Medicine, Healthy Ageing and Dementia Research, and Co-Director of the Centre for Healthy Longevity, at the National University Of Singapore, Professor Maier also holds professorship appointments at VU University Medical Centre , Amsterdam, Netherlands, and University of Melbourne, Australia, as well as is Director of Medicine and Community Care at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Australia. Professor Maier is also the President of the Australia and New Zealand Society for Sarcopenia and Frailty Research, as well as Founding President of the Healthy Longevity Medicine Society - https://hlms.co/ . A Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (FRACP), Professor Maier graduated in Medicine (MD) 2003 from the University of Lübeck (Germany), was registered 2009 in The Netherlands as Specialist in Internal Medicine-Geriatrics and was appointed Full Professor of Gerontology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (The Netherlands) in 2013 where she was the head of Geriatrics at the Vrije Universiteit Medical Center from 2012 to 2016. From 2016 to early 2021, Professor Maier served as Divisional Director of Medicine and Community Care at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, Australia, and as Professor of Medicine and Aged Care at the University of Melbourne, Australia. Professor Maier’s research focuses on unraveling the mechanisms of ageing and age-related diseases and during the last 10 years she has conducted multiple international observational cohort studies and intervention trials and has published more than 350 peer-reviewed articles. She is a frequent guest on radio and television programs to disseminate aging research and an invited member of several international academic and health policy committees, including the WHO. She also serves as selected Member of The Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities.Support the show

Send us a textAmbassador Nancy G. Brinker (https://nancybrinker.com/) is Founder of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation (https://www.komen.org/) and Co-Founder of the Promise Fund of Florida (https://www.promisefundofflorida.org/). Amb. Brinker is a three-time Ambassador and New York Times best-selling author who is regarded as the leader of the global breast cancer movement. Her journey began with a promise to her dying sister, Susan G. Komen, that she would do everything possible to end the shame, pain, fear, and hopelessness caused by this disease. In one generation, the organization that bears Susan’s name has changed the world. In 2009, President Barack Obama honored Amb. Brinker with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, for this work. The same year, she was named Goodwill Ambassador for Cancer Control for the United Nations’ World Health Organization, where she continued her mission to put cancer control at the top of the world health agenda. In 2010, Amb. Brinker released her New York Times best-selling memoir “Promise Me - How a Sister's Love Launched the Global Movement to End Breast Cancer”, an inspirational story of her transformation from bereaved sister to the undisputed leader of the ongoing international movement to end breast cancer. From 2001-2003, Amb. Brinker served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Hungary and served as U.S. Chief of Protocol from 2007-2009. Amb. Brinker is also the host of a weekly show on Newsmax TV which features news makers, corporate leaders, and high-profile cultural thought leaders. In 2018, Amb. Brinker spearheaded the creation of the Promise Fund of Florida, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to improve the outcomes and reduce deaths from breast and cervical cancers in Palm Beach County, where 80,000 women reside with no insurance and no medical home. The Promise Fund is utilizing partnerships, navigation, policy changes, and community awareness to build a model of care to be replicated throughout the country. The Promise Fund provides necessary education and screenings to prevent late-stage diagnosis and improve community health for under-resourced women confronting health disparities.Support the show

Send us a textDr. Doris A. Taylor, Ph.D. is Chief Executive Officer of Organamet Bio Inc. (https://organametbio.com/) an early phase start-up committed to saving lives and reducing the cost of healthcare for those with heart disease. Organamet has a goal is to make personalized bio-engineered human hearts, available to all who need them, within 5 years, increasing availability and access to hearts, decreasing or eliminating need for immunosuppression, reducing total lifetime transplant costs, and improving quality of life. Dr. Taylor was previously the Director, Regenerative Medicine Research and Director, Center for Cell and Organ Biotechnology, at the Texas Heart Institute in Houston, Texas, where she worked on the integration of regenerative medicine and tissue engineering. Dr. Taylor has a Ph.D. in Pharmacology from UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas. She did her post-doctoral studies at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx, New York, where she first worked with tissue engineering, growing heart muscle cells in the laboratory. Dr. Taylor was on the faculty of Duke University from 1991 to 2007, and then moved to University of Minnesota, where in 2008 her team published a landmark paper in Nature Medicine where they created new beating rat hearts using a combination of tissue engineering processes, first stripping the dead dying cells away from an existing heart (in a process called "de-cellularization") leaving behind the hearts extracellular matrix and then re-seeding the matrix by injecting new young rat stem cells. Dr. Taylor is also Co-Founder and original Board member of Miromatrix Medical Inc. Dr. Taylor's work has been published in Nature Medicine, Circulation Research, The Journal of Molecular Biology, The Journal of Biochemistry, Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC), Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), and other top-tier scientific journals. She holds a number of invention disclosures, patent applications and patents and is the founder of multiple companies dedicated to cardiovascular repair technologies. She is a member of the Society for Women's Health Research (SWHR) Cardiovascular Working Group and the Organization for the Study of Sex Differences (OSSD). Other professional affiliations include the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the American Heart Association (AHA), and the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), among others. She recently served on the Executive Committee for the Alliance for Regenerative Medicine (ARM). Dr. Taylor has been recognized by the AHA for Top 10 Research Advances. Her work has been recognized and featured by 60 Minutes, NPR, CNN, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC Horizon, BBC News Health, ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, Associated Press, National Public Radio, Good Morning America, Forbes, the Oprah Winfrey Show, NOVA Science Now, Discovery Channel’s Through the Worm Hole with Morgan Freeman, Science Channel’s Stem Cell Universe with Stephen Hawking, and numerous other worldwide media outlets.Support the show

Send us a textDan Harary (https://www.danhararyauthor.com/) is an author, entertainment industry publicist, drummer and former stand-up comic. While best known for his 50 years of work in Hollywood as an entertainment industry publicist and owner of the boutique Asbury PR Agency (https://asburypr.com/) in Beverly Hills, Dan is also the author of four books: Flirting With Fame - A Hollywood Publicist Recalls 50 Years of Celebrity Close Encounters, After They Came, Inside The Cutting Room: A Backstage Look at New York's Last Rock 'n' Roll Mecca and Carrots: True Confessions of a Hollywood Sex Addict (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1629339652/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i2) A native of Ocean Township, NJ, Dan worked as Stage Manager at the legendary Sunshine Inn concert hall in Asbury Park in the early 1970’s, with such now iconic musicians as Bruce Springsteen, KISS and Fleetwood Mac. Dan graduated Boston University, with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Communications, having studied TV production, advertising, marketing and journalism – ironically, every type of communications EXCEPT public relations, worked at Columbia Pictures/New York and relocated to Los Angeles in 1980. Dan's first post in Hollywood was as an Assistant at the American Film Institute; he then landed in-house PR positions with: the Playboy Channel (where he handled all PR and Program Information for the TV programs, movies and specials including events which were held at Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Mansion), Columbia Pictures Television, working closely with Brooke Shields on the Blue Lagoon, as well as being in charge of PR for the syndicated TV series “The New Gidget,” “What’s Happening Now!” and “The Real Ghostbusters”, and two top Hollywood entertainment PR agencies (Solters/Roskin/Friedman and The Lippin Group), before launching his own PR Agency in 1996 where he specializes in the representation of clients and individuals working across all areas of the entertainment and leisure industries.Support the show