Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today have achieved enormous strides in science and medicine throughout history, and we are better off for it. Two well-known examples are the contributions of Rosalind Franklin to our knowledge of the molecular structures of DNA and Marie Curie’s discovery of radium, which paved the way for the x-ray.
What, though, of the women who are driving today’s revolutionary changes in the life sciences? In fields ranging from epidemiology to CRISPR, forward-thinking women scientists are breaking new ground and shaping the future of medicine.
In addition, there is a steady emergence of exceptional female executives in the most prominent areas of the life sciences, with some taking the helm at Fortune 500 biotechs and others starting up ground-breaking startups. However, they are all making headway on some of the most pressing issues and possibilities in the biological sciences today.
Here are the Top 7 Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today;
1. Nina Tardon
American biomedical engineer Nina Tandon is the brains behind and head of EpiBone, the first firm in the world to generate live human bones for skeletal repair. After deciding to focus her studies on biomedical engineering, Tandon started exploring the potential of stem cells and electrical impulses to facilitate the ‘growth of one’s own bone’ in circumstances when patients with severe injuries need a bone transplant to replace lost bone.
The only previous treatment options for these patients involved either using bone from a donor or harvesting bone from another part of the patient’s body; both of these procedures carried risks of rejection, disease, and infection due to individual differences in how the body reacts to the treatment. Nina Tardon is one of the Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today.
Improved bone growth and regeneration, a shorter surgical procedure, faster recovery, and minimal chance of foreign implantation issues are all benefits of the individualized bone grafts made possible by Tandon’s cutting-edge medical technology. EpiBone’s efforts have the potential to improve the lives of as many as 900,000 people who have bone-related surgery each year.
According to Tandon, this technique has the potential to be developed further, with pluripotent stem cells creating models of patients’ organs that can be used to test medications and therapies, perhaps ushering in a new age of personalized medicine.
2. Cori Bargmann
Because of her groundbreaking research into the genetics of neural circuits and insights into the functioning of brain cells, Cori Bargmann was awarded the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences in 2013. She found that a single gene alteration in the brains of nematodes (microscopic worms) may cause the animals to either avoid or seek out certain compounds.
These results have the potential to pave the way for the treatment of neurological disorders like Alzheimer’s and autism, which have proven difficult to manage so far. As Bargmann put it in an interview with R&D magazine, “with your own hands, with your own eyes, you may uncover something that has never been seen before.” That fact alone was enough to hook me.
As of 2015, she serves as president of the Chan Zuckerberg Science Initiative due to her dedication to the advancement of scientific knowledge. That’s why Cori Bargmann is one of the Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today.
The program’s funding of fundamental research that has the potential to enhance whole disciplines is intended to hasten development and facilitate larger achievements in the scientific community as a whole. by providing funding for research that has the potential to enhance whole areas, increasing the collective efficacy of the scientific community as a whole.
3. Katrin Amunts
German neuroscientist Katrin Amunts has spent her career constructing a 3D model of the human brain she calls the “Big Brain,” and her efforts have earned her international acclaim. Creating this “digital atlas” of the brain is important to the larger Human Brain Project, a decade-long attempt to solve the many mysteries of neuroscience and improve treatments for neurological disorders.
The human brain fascinates Amunts because “it is one of the most complicated systems in nature,” she says in an interview. “It evolves during the full life and differs amongst human individuals.” Learning about the brain’s functions and illnesses is essential to a complete understanding of the human condition.
Amunts’s study is focused on this goal; she hopes that a brain atlas will help us better understand the brain and its complexity, which will lead to better treatments for conditions including depression, anxiety, dementia, and Parkinson’s. Katrin Amunts set an example as Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today.
In addition to her role as a professor for Brain Research at Heinrich-Heine University Duesseldorf, Amunts chairs the Human Brain Project’s Science and Infrastructure Board and is the Director of the Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine at Germany’s Research Centre Juelich.
4. Emma Walmsley – CEO at GSK
Emma Walmsley, who was formerly the head of GSK Consumer Care, was named the company’s chief executive officer in early 2017 and is now widely recognized as one of the most influential Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today and among the most accomplished businesswomen in the UK.
Walmsley has started a major restructuring of the organization since he came on board. This includes the 2019 merger of the firm’s consumer health division with Pfizer’s consumer healthcare business, which was spun off from the original company in a separate transaction. Although we had our doubts at first, the plan seems to be working, and her measured risks have given the company a new lease on life.
Even more so since she lacks a scientific education, Walmsley’s success in the pharmaceutical sector is a testament to the amazing talent she amassed while serving in a variety of marketing and general management positions at L’Oreal over the course of her 17-year career.
5. Reshma Kewalramani – CEO at Vertex Pharmaceuticals
Upon joining Vertex Pharmaceuticals as its CEO in 2020, Reshma Kewalramani became the first Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today to hold such a position at a major biotech firm.
For the last 15 years and counting, Dr. Reshma Kewalramani has focused her career on creating novel medications to better the lives of patients. Kewalramani joined Vertex in 2017 as its senior vice president of late development after working for Amgen for 12 years; in 2018, he was named to replace the outgoing chief medical officer.
Orkambi and Symdeko, two of Vertex’s medications for cystic fibrosis, received broader authorization that year. Trikafta, which the FDA authorized in 2019, is hoped to help people with cystic fibrosis live longer and better lives.
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6. Anglea Hwang – Group President at Pfizer
Angela Hwang is the Group President of the Pfizer Biopharmaceuticals Group and a member of Pfizer’s Executive Team. With the help of its 26,000 employees in 125 different countries, Pfizer was able to bring over 600 new medications and goods to market and increase its income by 80%.
She was placed #16 on Fortune’s list of the 50 Most Powerful Women and was included on Crain’s 2019 list of Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today.
Hwang was key in shaping Pfizer’s Covid-19 vaccine logistics, including how to store and deliver the vaccine at the optimal temperature. The Covid vaccine’s direct-to-consumer advertising campaign also features Hwang prominently.
7. Belin Garijo – Vice Chair of the Executive Board and Deputy CEO of Merck
After spending time at Sanofi, Garijo decided to make the switch to Merck in 2011. Before becoming CEO of the German pharmaceutical company’s healthcare division in 2015, she served as a chief operating officer of the EMD Serono biopharma business.
After a radical repositioning of the portfolio, a reform of R&D, and an adjustment to the commercial strategy, Healthcare at Merck has become a leading player in the fields of cancer, immunology, and immuno-oncology under her direction.
In 2021, Belin Garijo will become the second female CEO of a major pharmaceutical business, joining Emma Walmsley in a select group. With an eye on expanding its footprint in oncology, GSK paid up to $4.2 billion in 2019 for binstrafusp alfa, an immunotherapy for cancer developed by Merck KGaA.
With Garijo’s appointment, a partnership between two major biopharma companies led by women will soon be established in the field of immunotherapy. That’s why Belin Garijo is one of the Women Leaders in Lifesciences Today.
