Leadership

JBEI follows a high-performing private industry model for its management structure. Top-level leadership is provided by the CEO, CSTO, COO and divisional vice presidents. External oversight is provided by the Board of Directors with executive-level representatives from each of the partner institutions comprising board. Additional guidance is provided by the Advisory Committee and the Targets Council.

view profile for Jay Keasling

Jay Keasling

Chief Executive Officer and Director of New Pathway Development

Jay Keasling is also the Philomathia Foundation Chair in Alternative Energy at UC Berkeley. A professor in the Departments of Bioengineering and of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Keasling holds a senior faculty scientist position at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He is one of the world’s foremost authorities on synthetic biology.

view profile for Justin Heady

Justin Heady

Chief Operating Officer

Justin Heady is JBEI's Chief Operating Officer and the Deputy of Operations of the Biological Systems & Engineering Division for the Biosciences Area at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He has over 25 years of experience concentrating on financial management and research program development.

view profile for Blake Simmons

Blake Simmons

Chief Science & Technology Officer and Vice President for Deconstruction

Blake Simmons is Division Director of the Biological Systems & Engineering Division for the Biosciences Area at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. A chemical engineer by training, his expertise includes biomass pretreatment, enzyme engineering, biofuel cells, nanomaterials, microfluidics, desalination and silica biomineralization.

view profile for Corinne Scown

Corinne Scown

Vice President for Life-Cycle, Economics and Agronomy and Director of Life-Cycle and Technoeconomic Analysis

Corinne Scown is a Senior Scientist in the Energy Technologies Area and leader of the Sustainable Energy Systems Group and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. At JBEI, she is Vice President of the Life-cycle, Economics, and Agronomy Division. Corinne’s research focuses on modeling the cost and environmental impacts of producing bioenergy and bioproducts.

view profile for Henrik Vibe Scheller

Henrik Vibe Scheller

Vice President for Feedstocks and Director of Cell Wall Biology

Henrik Vibe Scheller is a Senior Scientist with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, an Adjunct Professor with the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology at the University of California Berkeley, and with the Department of Plant Biology and Biotechnology at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. He is an authority on enzymes involved in cell wall biosynthesis.

view profile for Aindrila Mukhopadhyay

Aindrila Mukhopadhyay

Vice President for Biofuels and Bioproducts, and Director of Host Engineering

Aindrila Mukhopadhyay is a Senior Scientist of the Biological Systems and Engineering Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. At JBEI, in addition to her role as Vice President of the Biofuels and Bioproducts Division, Mukhopadhyay leads the Host Engineering group to develop robust scalable microbial strains that show high tolerance and productivity during biofuels and chemicals production.

view profile for Paul Adams

Paul Adams

Vice President for Technology and Director of Structural Biology

Paul Adams is a Senior Scientist and the Associate Laboratory Director for Biosciences at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and an Adjunct Professor at the Department of Bioengineering for the University of California Berkeley. He is a leading authority on X-ray crystallography and structural biology.