Gender Male
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Dr. Urdea has devoted his 30-year career to human diagnostics in a variety of capacities. He has been involved in the discovery of new biomarkers, the development of new technologies for biomarker discovery, validation and commercialization, diagnostic test development, manufacturing and marketing, and the management of companies involved in these
activities.
Dr. Urdea founded and is a Managing Partner for Halteres Associates, a biotechnology consulting firm.
He also founded and served as Chief Executive Officer of Tethys Bioscience, a proteomics-based diagnostics company involved in preventative personalized medicine. Tethys’ first product was the protein-based PreDx Diabetes Risk Score Test, which was introduced in 2008.
Additionally, Dr. Urdea is a founder and the Chairman of Catalysis Foundation for Health, an organization addressing gaps in global healthcare caused by inefficiencies in disease diagnosis and monitoring.
He serves as an expert consultant to the life sciences industry and is on the scientific advisory boards and boards of directors of a number of biotechnology, diagnostics, venture capital and philanthropic organizations.
Prior to his current business activities, Dr. Urdea founded the Nucleic Acid Diagnostics group at Chiron Corporation, and with colleagues, invented branched DNA molecules for amplification of signal in nucleic acid complexes. Application of this technology resulted in the first commercial products for quantification of human hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and human immunodeficiency viruses (HBV, HCV, and HIV, respectively). He then became business head of the Molecular Diagnostics group and Chief Scientific Officer at Bayer Diagnostics.
He was also a member of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Diagnostic Forum. Dr. Urdea is an author on nearly 200 peer-reviewed scientific publications, nearly 300 abstracts and international scientific presentations, and more than 100 issued and pending patents.
He received his BS in Biology and Chemistry from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff and his Ph.D in Biochemistry from Washington State University in Pullman.
