10 Things You Didn’t Know About Alex Zhavoronkov
Alex Zhavoronkov is the chief executive officer of a company called Insilico Medicine. He is a brilliant researcher and clinician who has spent countless hours searching for treatments and cures for age-related diseases. His career achievements could fill volumes of books. If you’re not familiar with his work, now is a good time to become more familiar with his contributions to understanding more about the aging process and how the latest in medical technology in regenerative medicine shows promise for improving the quality of life. Here are 10 things you probably didn’t know about Alex Zhavoronkov
1. Alex Zharonkov is a dynamic and busy leader
According to Loop, Alex Zharonkov is involved in more than one high-responsibility project simultaneously. He is the CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc. The startup is based at the Emerging Technology Centers housed on the campus of the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. At the same time, he serves as the Chief Science Officer for the Biogerontology Research Foundation. The latter is a registered aging research charity based in the United Kingdom.
2. He uses technology to solve medical mysteries
The work that Alex performs is complicated. He employs the use of deep learning and activation of advanced signaling pathways to discover biomarkers and drugs that may be repurposed for the treatment of age-related diseases and the effects of aging. His work depends upon the latest technology to more rapidly analyze complex biological data sets to arrive at conclusions that act as pieces in a puzzle when trying to find treatment solutions.
3. He wears many hats
Zhavoronkov serves as the director of a knowledge management project that is called the International Aging Research Portfolio. He is also the head of the Federal Clinical Research Center for Pediatric Hematology, Oncology, and Immunology’s Regenerative Medicine Laboratory. This is one of the world’s biggest centers for children’s cancer. He is involved with several prestigious research organizations at the same time.
4. He specializes in advanced technology-based research
Dr. Zhavoronkov is an adjunct professor at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. Even though his schedule is packed with work distributed among dozens of different projects and organizations, he still takes the time to share his knowledge with others in pursuit of higher learning. His research specializations lie in the area of artificial intelligence, GPU computing, deep learning, regenerative medicine, and systems biology of aging. He has also spent significant time in the research of cancer diagnostics.
5. He is an author
Alex Zhavoronkov is also a prolific author who has contributed to many scientific research papers and articles where the findings of the research he and his teams conducted are discussed. He has also published a book titled “The Ageless Generation: How Advances in Biomedicine Will Transform the Global Economy.” The book was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2013. He has been involved in age-related research and writing since the year 2004.
6. Alex is the founder of Insilico Medicine
According to his LinkedIn profile, Alex Zhavoronkov is not only the CEO of Insilico Medicine, but he is also the founder and owner of the startup. The company has a workforce that is made up of more than 100 scientists along with a research and development center.
7. He oversees an international research center
The Insilico Medicine research center has grown and expanded into multiple countries throughout the world. It is based in the United States but also has a presence in Russia, the United Kingdom, Belgium, and Greater China. Dr. Zhavoronkov shared that half of the centers maintain an exclusive focus on the application of deep learning methods for drug discovery. Through Insilico, Alex has contributed to the invention of several drug discovery technologies and has secured multiple patents in biomarker development and generative chemistry with other patents pending.
8. His education is extensive
Alex Zhavoronkov attended the NCBI, NLM, National Institutes of Health where he studied NCBI Power Scripting n Bethesda, Maryland. In 1998 he attended the Canadian Securities Institute taking CSC, CPH courses for one year, studying financial markets and investment products to become a registered Investor, in Toronto, Canada. In 1997 he attended Queen’s University where he earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science in 2001. He made the Dean’s list. In 2005 he attended The Johns Hopkins University where he earned his Master of Science degree in Biotechnology, with a concentration in drug discovery and molecular targets. He also attended the Lomonosov Moscow State University where he earned his Ph.D. in physics in 2008. He specialized in the racemization of amino acids in proteins in the course of aging as his chief area of interest.
9. He started his career as an engineer
Alex lists his first employment experience working in British Columbia, Canada at a company called PMC-Sierra, Inc. He started his career as a product marketing engineer in 2001, spending one year on the job. He worked as an engineer in the morning and the evening, he was a marketer. He left for a manager position in Toronto, Ontario Canada at Markham. He worked with Asian ATI manufacturing partners in the position for one year before moving on. His next job was in Oberhaching (Munich), Germany in 2002. He was a regional manager of Eastern Europe in the technology sector and spent 2 years in the position.
10. He is a serial entrepreneur
Alex Zhavoronkov worked in various jobs in the technology and biological research industries. He gained experience for a year or two, then moved up to more progressively responsible positions. He worked as a manager, director, consultant, and organizer for high-tech conferences. He also founded the International Aging Research Portfolio, which is a non-profit research organization. He launched the enterprise in October of 2008 and dedicated 10 years and 3 months to the project. Alex has been involved in multiple biotech research projects simultaneously and he continues to maintain international collaborations for the development of new technologies that will help find treatments for age-related conditions and diseases.
