Renee Diane Wegrzyn (born November 25, 1976) is an American applied biologist who has served as the inaugural director of the

Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) is an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services. Its mission is to "make pivotal investments in break-through technologies and broadly applicable platforms, capabilities, r ...

since October 2022, ending in February 2025.

Education

Wegrzyn earned a Bachelor of Science and PhD in applied biology from

Georgia Tech The Georgia Institute of Technology (commonly referred to as Georgia Tech, GT, and simply Tech or the Institute) is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. Established in 1885, it has the lar ...

Career

From 2003 to 2006, Wegrzyn worked as a post-doctoral research fellow at th
Center for Molecular Biology of Heidelberg University
From 2006 to 2008, she worked as the assay development group leader for Adlyfe, a biotechnology company. In 2009, she was a senior scientist at Meso Scale Discovery and in 2012, she was a fellow at the

Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security (abbreviated CHS) is an independent, nonprofit organization of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The center works to protect people's health from epidemics and pandemics and ensures ...

. From 2009 to 2016, she worked as a senior lead technologist at

Booz Allen Hamilton Booz Allen Hamilton Holding Corporation (informally Booz Allen) is the parent of Booz Allen Hamilton Inc., an American company specializing in intelligence, AI, and digital transformation. It is headquartered in McLean, Virginia, in the Washing ...

. From 2016 to 2020, she served as a program manager in the Biological Technologies Office of

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adva ...

, where she specialized in synthetic biology and

biosecurity Biosecurity refers to measures aimed at preventing the introduction or spread of harmful organisms (e.g. viruses, bacteria, plants, animals etc.) intentionally or unintentionally outside their native range or within new environments. In agricult ...

. Since 2018, she has been a senior advisor to the

Nuclear Threat Initiative The Nuclear Threat Initiative, generally referred to as NTI, is a non-profit organization located in Washington, D.C. NTI was founded in 2001 by former U.S. Senator Sam Nunn and philanthropist Ted Turner and describes itself as a "a nonprofit, ...

. In 2020, she joined

Ginkgo Bioworks Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings, Inc. is an American biotech company founded in 2008 by five scientists from MIT, headed by Jason Kelly. The company specializes in using genetic engineering to produce bacteria with industrial applications for other bio ...

as vice president of business development. In September 2022, President

Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...

announced his appointment of Wegrzyn to be the inaugural director of the recently created

under the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...

within the

Department of Health and Human Services The United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is a cabinet-level executive branch department of the US federal government created to protect the health of the US people and providing essential human services. Its motto is ...

. Wegrzyn was sworn in by Secretary

Xavier Becerra Xavier Becerra (; born January 26, 1958) is an American attorney and politician who served as the 25th United States secretary of health and human services, a position he held from March 19, 2021 to January 20, 2025. He is the first Latino to h ...

on October 11, 2022. She was dismissed by the

Trump administration Presidency of Donald Trump may refer to: * First presidency of Donald Trump, the United States presidential administration from 2017 to 2021 * Second presidency of Donald Trump, the United States presidential administration since 2025 See also * ...

in February 2025.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wegrzyn, Renee 21st-century American biologists American biotechnologists 21st-century American women scientists Georgia Tech alumni Living people National Institutes of Health people United States Department of Defense officials Women government officials American women biologists Women biotechnologists Biden administration personnel 1976 births