I started my scientific career studying Alzheimer’s disease neurodegeneration across academia and industry. I am now a science and technology venture leader leveraging my scientific training across legislative, diplomatic, and emerging technology environments. Leading the UK’s science strategy in the southwest US and securing New York’s first $360m quantum technology commercialization program, I feel I’m ready to be your Life Sciences Operator, Lead.
The rapid development of emerging technologies has the potential to profoundly impact the innovation landscape. Ensuring that policymakers, scientists and industry leaders are strategically aligned and remain proactive, not reactive, in research standards, applications, funding calls, and trade can shape the coming decades of economic security. These experiences have made me a strategic thinker capable of steering stakeholders towards common goals, assess research trends, mitigate risk, and capture high impact trade opportunities for civil and defense applications.
In my current role leading science and innovation policy within Governor Kathy Hochul’s office, I am leveraging all my previous experiences to create a quantum strategy for New York that harnesses the existing technology ecosystem to attract new investment and grow New York’s quantum economy in areas such as life science, finance, space, defense and transportation. Knowing that quantum technologies will reshape New York’s economic security, I spearheaded internal deliberations that unite our university, industry, business and government partners around shared economic and national security values. Working cross-government, I delivered a package of activities that launched New York state’s first quantum portfolio from the ground up. I centralized technology decision-making into one plan and built an intelligence framework to monitor and respond to disruptive quantum funding calls, policies and scientific breakthroughs. Securing $150,000 in bespoke funding, I led the contracting of expert consultants who can derive independent analysis of New York’s quantum landscape and provide 2-, 5-, and 10-year timescale recommendations. Importantly, I facilitated in-person lab delegations with state leaders to visit NY’s quantum labs in order to ensure policy makers were informed directly by our scientific leaders, and to see first-hand quantum technology demonstrations. During the budget season, I led the drafting and formulation of New York’s Quantum Technology hubs proposal and ensured it was expertly informed by the latest science and policy directives from local, national and international perspectives. Together, these activities led to the passing of a new $360 million investment into quantum commercialization hubs as part of the 2026 state budget. I believe New York can be a leader in emerging technology through adding new capabilities, boosting research competitiveness and shaping the US national dialog that promotes New York job creation.
As the head for Science and Innovation within the British Consulate in Los Angeles, I had the privilege of leading the UK’s quantum technology program in the Southwest US. Namely, to ensure that US/UK quantum science labs remained aligned and allied across quantum application areas (sensing, navigation, computing, etc). When I realized that NASA and UK Space Agency were keen to close gaps in space quantum applications, I immediately drafted a strategy that identified shared goals, security gaps, and stakeholders that can attract government investment. Through a small program fund of $12,000, I built an exchange program that brought quantum scientists from NASA JPL, University of Arizona, UCLA, UCSD, and University of Utah to visit all the quantum hubs in the UK. This experience uncovered new opportunities for collaboration, policy and government intervention that resulted in JPL adopting quantum sensing technology from University of Birmingham for missions and a further $1.5 million in bespoke research awards for quantum computing and navigation. This delegation taught me that face-to-face interactions can unlock new relationships that build trust and respect. Learning that Southern California quantum leaders have never met in person, I convened lab leads from UCSB, UCLA, USC, UCSD, Google, JPL, Caltech and Orca Computing to discuss how quantum can benefit local economies such as in transportation, data security and disaster management. This intimate gathering positioned my team as trusted partners for growing LA’s quantum economy through venture capital programs, and UK companies opening offices at UCLA’s $700 million quantum research park.
The UK AI Safety Summit of 2023 kicked off a first-of-its-kind meeting to lay the foundations for international AI safety. This resulted in a series of commitments such as the Bletchley Declaration and President Biden’s Executive Order on the Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence. Importantly, the US and the UK launched twin AI Safety Institutes to enable seamless collaboration across borders. Though still in development, important policy discussions should be held in areas related to cultivating talent, evaluation of models, careers in AI Safety, and foundational models. With nations committing substantial amounts of research funding to support scientists, how industry, government and academia will work together on AI policy is an ongoing question. Knowing this, I inspired consensus across the UK government, led advocacy info sessions and sponsored seminars with US partners in Utah, Arizona and California to deliver a series of UK delegations across the US that resulted in new AI in biosecurity, AI in critical minerals and AI in energy partnerships with more than six universities.
Through the NY Governor’s office, I have coordinated across legislative branches to bring AI Safety to the forefront of our technology policy. In 2024, New York became the first state in the nation to enact a law limiting how state agencies can use AI in decision-making processes — the LOADinG Act — which established requirements around automated decision-making systems and created a publicly accessible inventory of AI tools used by state entities. Building on that foundation, the Office of Information Technology Services developed New York’s first statewide Acceptable Use of AI policy, guiding agencies in safe and responsible AI adoption, and issued guidance for agencies to identify and catalog AI systems in a transparent public inventory. That work extended further in 2026, when, building on the success of a 1,200-person training pilot across eight state agencies, ITS expanded AI education and the secure AI Pro assistant to the entire 100,000-plus person state workforce, making New York the largest state in the nation to do so. In partnership with the Chief AI Officer, our office has worked to ensure that AI technologies deployed across state government align with agency goals, comply with state policy, and deliver meaningful benefits to New Yorkers. Most significantly, Governor Hochul signed The RAISE Act into law in December 2025, requiring transparency and disclosures from frontier AI model developers operating in New York. The RAISE Act requires large AI developers to publish their safety protocols and report critical incidents to the state within 72 hours, and establishes a new oversight office within the Department of Financial Services to facilitate transparency and accountability of frontier AI.
Co-founding the National Science Policy Network (NSPN), I created pathways for peers to distill complex scientific issues into accessible policy memos for lay audiences and representatives, offering scientifically informed approaches to global issues that protect civil rights and reduce wasteful spending. NSPN now comprises over 2,000 early-career researchers and scientists. During the COVID-19 pandemic, I led my team to open an emergency pop-up testing lab in Brooklyn, NY, within six weeks, secured enough free tests for 25,000 people, and developed algorithms for the NY Department of Health to track COVID-19’s spread by zip code. These efforts saved over $75,000 in testing supplies and produced the first saliva-based test in the tri-state area. This work led to changes in the state laboratory certification process and to my recruitment as a fellow in the New York State Senate with Senator Gustavo Rivera, where I bridged the gap between scientists, lawmakers, and policy experts.
Thank you for considering my application. I look forward to the opportunity to discuss how my qualifications align with your needs and vision further.