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Graduate Education

Advanced Biotechnology Education | Faculty

Program Chair

Richard McCarty is the Chair.  He is the William D. Gill Professor of Biology and is Dean Emeritus of the Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences.  Ever since he was an undergraduate student at Hopkins, Dr. McCarty has been fascinated by solar energy conversion by green plants, otherwise known as photosynthesis.  His research focuses on the chloroplast enzyme that makes ATP.  The activity of this enzyme has the unusual property of being switched on during the day and off at night.

Dr. McCarty received his PhD in Biochemistry from Johns Hopkins.  For nearly twenty-five years he was on the faculty of the Section of Biochemistry, Molecular and Cell Biology, Cornell University.  He was Chair of the Section for five years and was Director of Cornell’s Biotechnology Program for three years.  In 1990 he returned to Hopkins as Chair of the Department of Biology and has served as the Interim Dean of the Krieger School and the James B. Knapp Dean of the Krieger School.  He served as Chair of this Program from 1998 to 1999 and is happy to be back.

Program Directors

Patrick Cummings is the Director of the Center for Biotechnology Education and the Program Director for the Master of Science in Biotechnology at Johns Hopkins Advanced Academic Programs. Dr. Cummings received his masters and doctoral degrees in Infectious Disease and Microbiology from the University Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health. He completed a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in molecular biology and cell biology at the Wistar Institute & the University of Pennsylvania . Following completion of his training and before joining Johns Hopkins University, Patrick held a faculty position at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore. Dr. Cummings is the Past President of the Maryland Branch of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), and currently serves on the editorial board of the ASM Microbe Library Visual Resources Collection. Dr. Cummings teaches Principles of Immunology, Recombinant DNA Laboratory, Biodefense Laboratory Methods, Immunological Techniques in Biotechnology, and Cell Culture Techniques.

Lynn Langer is the Director of Enterprise and Regulatory Affairs Programs in the Center for Biotechnology Education at Johns Hopkins University where she is on faculty and heads the Master of Science in Bioscience Regulatory Affairs, the MS in Biotechnology/MBA, the MS in Biotechnology Enterprise and Regulatory Affairs concentration and the Certificate in Biotechnology Enterprise. She brings the merger of science and business to the program. Dr. Langer is on the board of directors of TEDCO, the Maryland Technology Development Corporation. Dr. Langer is on the board of directors and is President emeritus of Women In Bio, an organization of professionals committed to fostering and encouraging entrepreneurship and career development of women active in the life science industry. She attended Tulane University and the University of Maryland for her undergraduate degree in microbiology. She later received her MBA from Johns Hopkins University, and received the Stegman Award for academic excellence in Administrative Science. She received her PhD in Leadership and Change from Antioch University. While a student at Johns Hopkins she co-founded the Hopkins Professional Women's Network. Dr. Langer has headed the sales and marketing department of several biotechnology companies and worked as a consultant in the bioscience industry. She founded BioPlan Associates, a management and marketing consulting firm. She has worked extensively with leading biomedical and high technology companies. Dr. Langer has been involved in "think-tanks" with organizations such as NASA, developing potential biotechnology products to be tested in space and others in the biomedical field. She has published over fifty articles and several book chapters mainly in business areas of biotechnology and has taught a variety of graduate courses in biotechnology and business. Dr. Langer teaches Leading Change in Biotechnology, Managing and Leading Biotechnology Professionals, Bioscience Communication, Emerging Issues in Biotechnology, Marketing Aspects of Biotechnology and Proseminar in Biotechnology.

Kristina Obom is Program Director for the Master of Science in Bioinformatics and for the Master of Science in Biotechnology program, Johns Hopkins Advanced Academic Programs. She is an alumna of Hopkins, receiving her undergraduate degree from the School of Arts and Sciences in Public Health. Her training in public health continued at Yale University where she received a Masters in Public Health in Infectious Disease Epidemiology. Dr. Obom received her PhD from the City University of New York at Mt. Sinai School of Medicine in Biomedical Science, where she studied pox viruses. She has an interest in bioinformatics and taught bioinformatics and introductory biology in the Biology Department of the Catholic University of America. Dr. Obom currently teaches Virology, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Introduction to Bioinformatics, Biodefense Lab Methods and Cell Culture Techniques. She was a 2006 recipient of the Martin Luther King Award for Community Service.

Associate Director

Thomas Colonna , PhD, JD, Associate Director of Bioscience Regulatory Affairs programs, has a broad educational background with a BS (Microbiology) from the University of Sciences in Philadelphia, a PhD (Molecular Biology) from the Johns Hopkins University, and JD from the Georgetown University Law Center. He has published extensively in several areas and has extensive regulatory affairs experience.

Robert Lessick is a full-time instructor with the Center for Biotechnology Education and serves as its Associate Director for Online Education. Dr. Lessick was first exposed to Johns Hopkins University at the age of nine, as a part of Dr. Julian Stanley’s Study for Mathematically Precocious Youth (SMPY). He earned his Bachelor of Science Degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and after graduating from MIT, he spent a year at Harvard University studying the developmental genetics of roundworms. He went on to do a PhD in the Department of Biology at Johns Hopkins University, focusing on protein stability in hyperthemophilic organisms. Dr. Lessick was an editor and database manager for the Microbiology division at Cambridge Scientific Abstracts. He began teaching at Hopkins in 2001 and became full-time in 2004. He teaches several core courses for the biotechnology and bioinformatics degrees, but primarily focuses on Introduction to Bioinformatics, Biostatistics and Tools for Genome Analysis. Dr. Lessick also oversees the Biotechnology Thesis for Advanced Academic Programs.

Program Coordinator

Jamie Austin is the Coordinator and Student Advisor for Enterprise and Regulatory Science programs. In addition to being full time faculty, Ms. Austin is also an experienced regulatory consultant. She is Regulatory Affairs Certified (US and Canada) with specific expertise in developing regulatory strategies and managing submissions for medical devices and combination products. She earned her undergraduate degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Notre Dame and MS degree (Bioscience Regulatory Affairs) from the Johns Hopkins University. She is currently pursuing a PhD (Pharmaceutical Sciences) at the University of Michigan, where she studies molecular mechanisms of HIV-1 infection. Ms. Austin primarily teaches online courses in the regulatory science program, including Introduction to Regulatory Affairs and Biological Processes in Regulatory Affairs.

Beatrice Kondo  is the Program Coordinator for Bioinformatics and the post-master's certificate in Sequence Analysis and Genomics. Dr. Kondo also provides academic advising for all students whose ultimate goal is professional school (medical, dental, and veterinary). Dr. Kondo's undergraduate studies were at Loyola University in Baltimore. She then began a career in software test engineering, testing Hubble Space Telescope management and control software, before transitioning to the private sector, testing communications systems. Eventually the siren song of higher education lured her to a return into academia, and she completed a doctorate in Biological Sciences at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in 2006. Her publications are in the area of molecular phylogenetics, with a special emphasis on closely-related species and the evolution of migration in New World Orioles. Recognizing a love of teaching during her graduate career, Dr. Kondo pursued a teaching post-doc at Cornell College in Iowa, famous for its unusual one-course-at-a-time curriculum. After this, she taught for four years in the undergraduate program of the Department of Biology at The Johns Hopkins University, before joining the Advanced Academic Programs Center for Biotechnology Education in Fall 2011. Her experience in advising JHU undergraduates, who were predominantly pursuing admission to professional schools after graduation, gave her a lot of insight into the professional school application process. Dr. Kondo currently teaches Advanced Cell Biology I, Molecular Phylogenetic Techniques, and Comparative Animal Physiology.

Meredith Safford is the Coordinator for the Biotechnology of Education. Dr. Safford received her undergraduate degree from St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN, and earned a PhD in Biology from Johns Hopkins’ Department of Biology. She received further postdoctoral research training in immunology at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the National Institute on Aging, Baltimore. In addition to her experience working in the academic and government sectors, Dr. Safford also has worked in the biotechnology industry and scientific research publishing, having worked for Becton Dickinson Immunocytometry Systems, San Jose, CA, and the The Journal of Immunology, Bethesda, Maryland. Before joining AAP full-time in 2011 Dr. Safford held a part-time adjunct faculty appointment with AAP, beginning in 2001. Dr. Safford teaches on-site and online courses, which include Advanced Cell Biology II, Vaccinology, Principles of Immunology and Introduction to Biotechnology.

Katherine Wellman is the coordinator for the Biotechnology Enterprise programs and a full time faculty member in the Center for Biotechnology Education. These programs include the Masters in Biotechnology Enterprise and Entrepreneurship, the joint MS Biotechnology/MBA, the MS in Biotechnology concentration in biotechnology enterprise and the Certificate in Biotechnology Enterprise. Katherine brings extensive experience in various training, regulatory, operations, environmental, health and safety leadership positions in the pharmaceutical and life science business sectors domestically and internationally. She is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University, receiving her MS in Biotechnology from the Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and an MBA from the Carey Business School. She also earned an MS in Health and Safety from Indiana State University and a BS in Health and Safety, Biology and Public Health with an education emphasis from Ball State University. Katherine is a doctoral student in Public Administration at the University of Baltimore completing her dissertation on regulatory aspects of emerging technologies. Her research interests include governing science and technology and corporate social responsibility.

Faculty Members

Thomas Koval received a BS in Biology from The Pennsylvania State University and a PhD in Cell and Molecular Biology/Radiation Biology from The Ohio State University.   He completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Physiology and Biophysics/ Bioengineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  Dr. Koval has held faculty positions at Hahnemann Medical College in Philadelphia, PA, the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences in Washington, DC, and Mayo Medical School/Mayo Graduate School in Rochester, MN.  He has published extensively in cell and molecular biology, especially in the areas of cellular radiation damage/repair, stress-inducible cellular processes, and insect cell culture.  Dr. Koval began teaching in the AAP Biotechnology Program in 2002 and currently teaches Advanced Cell Biology I and Radiation Biology and oversees the Independent Research Project course.

Sherry Ogg Sherry Ogg received her BS in Dairy Science in 1985 from Delaware Valley College in Doylestown, PA. After working for one year as a large animal embryo transfer technician, she obtained her MS in Agriculture-Animal Science at California State University-Chico in 1988. She earned her PhD in Animal Science from the University of Maryland in 1994 and also completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Animal Sciences at the University of Maryland in 2001. Since 2000, Dr. Ogg has taught and continues to teach numerous online courses for the Advanced Academic Program in Biotechnology at Johns Hopkins University. These courses include Agricultural Biotechnology, Advanced Cell Biology I, Introduction to Bioinformatics, Molecular Biology, and Biofuels.

Karen Wells received her BS in Biochemistry in 1989 from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. She earned her PhD in Physiology and Pharmacology from Emory University in 1997, and then completed a post-doctoral fellowship in the Department of Physiology at Johns Hopkins Medical Institute in 2000. Since 1999, Karen has taught and continues to teach a mixture of on-site and online courses for Advanced Biotechnology Studies at the Johns Hopkins University. These courses include Biochemistry, Advanced Cell Biology I, Advanced Cell Biology II, Neurobiology, and Current Topics in Molecular & Cellular Biology.

Adjunct Faculty

Bruce Brown received his BS in Marine Science and Biology from Jacksonville University in Jacksonville FL. He earned his PhD in cell biology/immunology from University of Maryland at College Park. He completed his post-doctoral fellowship at the US military HIV research program (MHRP) and remained there as a staff scientist. At MHRP Bruce studied the ability of functional antibodies to interact with and inhibit HIV. These interactions could be as simple as traditional neutralization, or as complex as antibody dependant recruitment of NK cells to control infection. Currently Bruce is the assistant project director at the NIH-AIDS research and reference reagent program. He has been teaching Advanced Cell Biology I and Virology at JHU since 2003.

Calvin Chue is a 16 year veteran of the biodefense community having served in field operations, laboratory research and strategic management. He graduated from Stuyvesant High School in New York City, earned his Bachelor's degree at JHU (School of Arts & Sciences) and went on to complete his Ph.D. in Molecular Microbiology and Immunology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He has served with the US Navy Biological Defense Research Program, the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, the US Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, the Johns Hopkins Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies and the Dept of Homeland Security - National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center. He is pleased to have taught "Biological & Chemical Threat Response and Forensics" over the past 2.5 years and looks forward to many more years of educating future biodefense professionals.

Leon Epps is an Expert Review Chemist for the Division of Monoclonal Antibodies (DMA) of the Office of Biotechnology Products (OBP) in Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER) of the FDA. He is a scientific expert in the areas of radiolabeled monoclonal antibodies and peptide biologic products since 1999. He first joined the FDA in 1993 as a review chemist and regulatory coordinator in the Division of Application Review and Policy in the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER).

Jessica Faupel-Badger completed her Ph.D. in Tumor Biology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Rochester, MN and then joined the Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program (CPFP) at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), Bethesda, MD for her postdoctoral fellowship. During her time in this fellowship, she received a Master of Public Health degree in Epidemiology and Biostatistics from The George Washington University, Washington, DC. The properties of cancer cells have fascinated Jessica since her first research experiences as an undergraduate student. She now enjoys introducing others to the complexities of cancer biology and to how these fundamental properties can be exploited for both therapeutic and prevention strategies. Jessica has been part-time adjunct faculty in the Biotechnology Education Program since 2009. She teaches “Cancer Biology” on-site at the Montgomery County Campus and “Molecular Targets and Cancer” both on-site and online. Although both of these courses focus on the molecular underpinnings of cancer biology, staying true to her MPH training Jessica may occasionally drift into discussions of other issues surrounding the public health burden of cancer, such as societal and economic costs.

Jonathan Helfgott is a Compliance Officer for the FDA in the Center for Drug Evaluation & Research (CDER), within the Office of Scientific Investigations. Prior to joining CDER in 2010, My. Helfgott worked at the Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH) within the Division of Bioresearch Monitoring (BIMO). Mr. Helfgott specializes in Computerized Systems used in FDA regulated Clinical Investigations. Mr. Helfgott is the Co-Editor of the Food and Drug Law Institute's 2009 Publication, "Biomedical Software Regulation." Mr. Helfgott has also been published in peer reviewed journals such as Applied Clinical Trials, RAPS Focus, Association of Clinical Research Professionals, FDLI Update, Touch Health Briefings, and Medical Devices and Diagnostics Industry. Mr. Helfgott has also lectured for organizations such as DIA, ACRP, RAPS, SOCRA, SCDM, AdvaMed, CHI, CBI, and FDA News as well as academic institutions such as Northwestern University, Columbia University, Johns Hopkins University, University of Colorado Denver Medical School, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Georgetown University, Stanford University School of Medicine, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Shriners Hospitals, and NIH's National Heart Lung and Blood Institute. Mr. Helfgott co-developed the Software Education Program for the CDRH Staff College through the Medical Device Fellowship Program. Prior to joining FDA in May 2006, Mr. Helfgott conducted genetic research using micro-array technology at the NIH's National Institute on Aging. Mr. Helfgott received his MS from Johns Hopkins University and his BS in Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics from the University of Maryland College Park.

Brandon Higgs received a BS in Biochemistry from Indiana University, his Masters in Bioinformatics at Johns Hopkins, and his PhD in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology from the School of Computational Sciences at George Mason University. He has worked in the biotech, pharma, and government industries since 1999 in the areas of biomarker discovery and development, biostatistics, bioinformatics, genomics/genetics, and biodefense. Dr. Higgs began teaching in the AAP Biotechnology Program in 2004, he designed and currently teaches two courses: Microarrays and Analysis and Advanced Genomics and Genetics Analysis.

Elena Schwartz is the Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) of Ariadne Diagnostics LLC. She has a combined PhD in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry from the Institute of Biochemistry, Russia and the Pasteur Institute, France. She has over 19 years of research experience in disease-related biomarkers. Dr. Schwartz was involved in the development of novel diagnostic tests for cancer including lung, breast, ovarian and prostate. She also actively participated in discovering, developing, and commercializing novel therapeutic and diagnostic products for cancer and neuro- and muscular degenerative diseases. Dr.Schwartz has many publications in peer-reviewed journals including single-author major review papers. Since 2007, Dr. Schwartz has taught and continues to teach numerous online and onsite courses for the Advanced Academic Program in Biotechnology at Johns Hopkins University. These courses include Advanced Cell Biology I, Advanced Cell Biology II, and Biochemistry.

Lisa Selbie is the Assistant Project Coordinator of the Australian Biotechnology Initiative for the Master of Science in Biotechnology, Johns Hopkins Advanced Academic Program. Dr. Selbie has worked for many years in medical research after receiving her PhD in Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Cell Biology from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

Dr. Selbie completed a Post-Doctoral Fellowship with Professor John Shine at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in cloning and expressing the first human neuropeptide Y receptor. She continued as a Senior Research Scientist, and became a Project Leader in the Cooperative Research Centre for Biopharmaceuticals, developing neuropeptide Y agonists and antagonists. Dr. Selbie then moved to England as a Wellcome Trust Career Development Research Fellow at Queens Medical Centre in Nottingham, where her lab focused on the signal transduction of neuropeptide and neurotransmitter-stimulated pathways.

Dr. Selbie began teaching in the Advanced Academic Programs in Biotechnology at Johns Hopkins University in 2000, and her recent move to Sydney involves exploring ways to expand the graduate program to the international biotechnology community. Dr. Selbie currently teaches Advanced Cell Biology I & II and Molecular Basis of Pharmacology.

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