The White House plans to name Renee Wegrzyn, PhD, as inaugural director of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health — a new federal agency focused on ramping up biomedical and health research to drive breakthroughs in immunotherapy and cancer care and prevention.
As director, Dr. Wegrzyn will oversee ARPA-H's research portfolio and budget, according to a Sept. 12 statement from the White House.
"I am deeply honored to have the opportunity to shape ARPA-H's ambitious mission and foster a vision and approach that will improve health outcomes for the American people, including President Biden's Cancer Moonshot," Dr. Wegrzyn said.
Dr. Wegrzyn is currently the vice president for business development at Ginkgo Bioworks, a biotech company focused on cell programming. She is the former program manager of the biological technologies office of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, one of the institutions that inspired ARPA-H.