Daniel Reich, M.D., Ph.D.

Senior Investigator, NINDS
Translational Neuroradiology Section

Dr. Daniel Reich is Senior Investigator at NIH/NINDS, where he directs the Translational Neuroradiology Section and leads clinical studies focusing mainly on multiple sclerosis (MS). He is also an attending neuroradiologist at the NIH Clinical Center and an Adjunct Professor of Radiology, Neurology, and Biostatistics at Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Reich studied math and physics at Yale and earned his M.D. from Cornell and his Ph.D. in neurophysiology from The Rockefeller University, where he studied how nerve cells in the visual system encode what we see. His further training includes a fellowship in diagnostic neuroradiology and residencies in radiology and neurology at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Dr. Reich is a founder of the North American Imaging in MS (NAIMS) Cooperative. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Americas Committee for Treatment and Research in MS, the International Advisory Committee on Clinical Trials in Multiple Sclerosis, the Board of Professors of the Tuscan PhD Program in Neurosciences at the Universities of Florence, Pisa, and Siena, the Scientific Advisory Board of the Canadian Progressive Multiple Sclerosis Cohort, and the Editorial Board of Multiple Sclerosis Journal. He is also federal liaison to the International Biomedical Research Alliance. Dr. Reich is an elected member of the Association of American Physicians, the American Society of Clinical Investigation, and the Henry Kunkel Society, and he has won the American Neurological Association’s Derek Denny-Brown Young Neurological Scholar Award, the National MS Society’s Barancik Award for Innovation in MS Research, and the NIH Graduate Partnership Programs Outstanding Mentor Award.

Research in Dr. Reich’s NIH lab develops advanced MRI techniques to understand MS and adapts those techniques for clinical trials and patient care. The lab conducts investigator-initiated interventional clinical trials and harnesses noninvasive imaging modalities to dissect biological mechanisms of tissue damage, both by performing longitudinal studies on time scales relevant for disease processes and by examining radiological-pathological correlations in autopsy tissue and animal models. Dr. Reich has authored around 250 peer-reviewed publications, presented around 150 invited lectures across the world, and has been principal or associate investigator of more than 50 clinical protocols. In 2018, Dr. Reich’s lab discovered that human and nonhuman primates have a lymphatic system in the membranes covering the brain and showed how that system can be imaged noninvasively with MRI.

Michael J. Lenardo, M.D.

Section Chief, NIAID, NIH
Founder and Director (2001-2011)
NIH Oxford-Cambridge Scholars Program

Dr. Michael Lenardo was born in Chicago, Illinois on December 1, 1955. He attended the Johns Hopkins University and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Natural Sciences in 1977. He obtained his Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) from Washington University in St. Louis, Mo. in 1981. He carried out clinical and research training at the University of Iowa from 1981-1985. He was then a Research Fellow at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology with an adjunct appointment at Harvard Medical School. During this time, he carried out molecular biology research under the mentorship of Nobel laureates David Baltimore and Philip Sharp.

Dr. Lenardo has been Section Chief in the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), National Institutes of Health (NIH) from 1989 to the present, directing research on T-lymphocyte regulation, HIV-1, and genetic diseases of the immune system using advanced genomic technologies. In 2014, he was appointed Director of the Clinical Genomics Program of NIAID. He has served on the editorial boards for the European Journal of Immunology, the Journal of Experimental Medicine, Science magazine, and Biology Direct. He is an Adjunct Professor of Pathology at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and a Visiting Fellow at Cambridge University. Also, he directs cooperative research agreements on novel therapies for immunological disease with Merck, Novartis, and Regeneron pharmaceuticals. He is currently Director of the Clinical Genomics program.

Dr. Lenardo has founded or co-founded several joint research programs including the NIH-Oxford- Cambridge Biomedical Research Scholars, the NIH-University of Pennsylvania Immunology Program, the NIH-Marshall Scholars, the NIH-Rhodes Scholars, the National M.D./Ph.D. partnership program, and the NIH-Institute Pasteur Infectious Disease and Immunology Program. Dr. Lenardo has published over 200 scholarly works and holds a number of medical patents. Among his honors and awards, he is Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (O.B.E.), conferred by Queen Elizabeth II, March, 2006 and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, National Academy of Science and the National Academy of Medicine.

Alexandra J. Ambrico

Director of Communications, Education & Professional Development  

Alexandra Ambrico graduated from Indiana University with a Bachelor of Arts in Biology in 2014 and Stony Brook University with a Master of Science in Science Communication in 2022.

Alexandra joined the Alliance as the Administrative and Special Projects Manager in 2018 and was promoted to the Director of Communication, Education, and Professional Development in 2023. Alexandra utilizes her background and experience to make science, technology, engineering,
mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) more diverse, equitable, and inclusive. She aims to inspire the next generation of women in STEMM and her M.S. research explored role models and mentorship for women in STEMM.

Alexandra aims to be a leader within the communities she serves. In 2015, she co-founded Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory’s Women in Science and Engineering (WiSE) to combat gender bias
and disparities in STEMM and educate girls through community outreach initiatives. Alexandra
spearheaded the first science summer camp for girls on Long Island which is now in its 9th year,
interned at the Lasker Foundation as their social media ambassador, and served as a mentor for the New York Academy of Sciences: 1000 Girls, 1000 Futures Program. As a Research Technician II at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, she co authored seven publications in journals such as Science, Cell Reports, and the Journal of Cell Biology.

Alexandra’s passion shines through her ambition and innovative ideas. Combined with her education, experiences, and network, Alexandra’s background sets her up to be successful in creating change and inspiring the next generation of women in STEMM.

P. Roy Vagelos, M.D.

Director Emeritus
Chairman of the Board, Regeneron, Inc.
Chairman and CEO, Merck & Co., Inc. (Retired)

Dr. P. Roy Vagelos is Retired Chairman and CEO of Merck & Co., Inc. and Chairman of the Board of Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. He has been a member of the Board of the International Biomedical Research Alliance since 2010, moving to Director Emeritus status in 2013. He received an AB in 1950 from the University of Pennsylvania and an MD in 1954 from Columbia University. Following a residency at the Massachusetts General Hospital (1954-56), he joined the National Institutes of Health where from 1956-66 he served as Senior Surgeon and then Section Head of Comparative Biochemistry. In 1966 he became Chairman, Department of Biological Chemistry, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and in 1973 founded the University’s Division of Biology and Biomedical Sciences. In so doing, he established an unprecedented model for the fusion of a Medical School with an undergraduate Department of Biology. In 1975 he joined Merck Research Laboratories and became President of Research until 1985, when he became CEO and later Chairman of the company. He retired in 1994.

Dr. Vagelos is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society. For his seminal work on ACP and leadership of Merck, Dr. Vagelos was awarded the American Chemical Society’s Enzyme Chemistry Award in 1967, the National Academy of Science’s Chemistry in Service to Society Award in 1995 and was inducted into the National Business Hall of Fame in 1995. He has received many awards in science and business as well as 14 honorary doctorates. In the past, he was Chairman of the Board of the University of Pennsylvania and served on the boards of TRW, McDonnell Douglas, Prudential Finance, the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, The Nature Conservancy and the National Math & Science Initiative. He also served as Co-chairman of the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and President and CEO of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens.

Dr. Vagelos’ current philanthropic activities span academia through medicine to industry. He is Chairman of the Columbia University Medical Center Board of Advisors, the Columbia University Precision Medicine Council, and is Co-Chairman of the Columbia University Campaign Executive Committee. He is founder of three undergraduate programs at the University of Pennsylvania: Molecular Life Science (MLS), Life Sciences and Management (LSM) and the Vagelos Integrated Program in Energy Research (VIPER). He serves on a number of public policy and advisory boards.

Ralph Snyderman, M.D.

Director Emeritus
Chancellor Emeritus
James B. Duke Professor of Medicine Duke University

Dr. Ralph Snyderman is Chancellor Emeritus, Duke University and James B. Duke Professor of Medicine in the Duke University School of Medicine. He served as Chancellor for Health Affairs and Dean of the School of Medicine at Duke University from 1989 to July 2004 and led the transition of this excellent medical center into an internationally recognized leader of academic medicine. He oversaw the development of the Duke University Health System, one of the most successful integrated academic health systems in the country, and served as its first President and Chief Executive Officer. Dr. Snyderman has played a leading role in the conception and development of Personalized Health Care, an evolving model of national health care delivery. He was amongst the first to envision and articulate the need to move the current focus of health care from the treatment of disease-events to personalized, predictive, preventive, and participatory care. For this work, he received the 2012 David E. Rogers Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges who referred to Dr. Snyderman as the “father of personalized medicine.” In January of 2016 Dr. Snyderman was the recipient of the PMWC Pioneer Award at the 10th Personalized Medicine World Conference. The PMWC Pioneer Award is given on occasion to a rare individual who presaged the present-day excitement regarding personalized medicine at a time when only less evolved technology and less encouragement by peers existed but nevertheless made major advances in the field.

Earlier in his career, Dr. Snyderman performed seminal research defining how white blood cells respond to chemical signals to mediate host defense or tissue damage and is internationally recognized for his contributions in inflammation research. In 1987, he left Duke to serve as senior vice president for medical research at Genentech, Inc., a pioneering biomedical technology firm. While at Genentech, he led the development and licensing of several major biotechnology therapeutics. Dr. Snyderman has received numerous honors and awards during his career recognizing his contributions to research and to developing more rational, effective, and compassionate models of health care.

A graduate of Washington College in Chestertown, Maryland (1961), Snyderman received his M.D., magna cum laude, in 1965 from the Downstate Medical Center of the State University of New York. He served his internship and residency in medicine at Duke, and then worked as a Public Health Officer doing research in immunology at the NIH (1967-72). Dr. Snyderman joined the Board of Directors of the International Biomedical Research Alliance in 2012 and moved to Director Emeritus status in 2019.