Joshua Leonard

Leonard trained in chemical engineering, receiving a B.S. from Stanford University, and a Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley where he worked with gene therapy pioneer David Schaffer and earned a certificate in the management of technology from the Haas School of Business. Leonard then trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the Experimental Immunology Branch of the National Cancer Institute, where he elucidated features of the innate immune system that drive antiviral immunity and inform vaccine design. He then joined the faculty of Northwestern University in Chemical and Biological Engineering. Leonard’s group engineers novel biological systems that perform customized, sophisticated functions for applications in biotechnology and medicine. Leonard is an early pioneer in mammalian synthetic biology. Employing methods ranging from biomolecular engineering to computation-driven design, his group develops technologies including programmable cell-based devices for treating cancer and novel gene therapy platforms based upon bioengineered nanoscale vesicles. Leonard is actively engaged in the development of national science policy, testifying as an expert witness before the U.S. House of Representatives on “21st Century Biology” and through his roles as a council and board member of the Engineering Biology Research Consortium. He fosters training, entrepreneurship, and industrial impact as director of Northwestern’s NIH-funded Biotechnology Training Program (T32) and entrepreneurial activity as a founder and chief scientific officer of Syenex—a startup focused on making transformative gene delivery technologies universally accessible. Dr. Leonard is a founding member of Northwestern’s Center for Synthetic Biology, which has grown to a leading team within the SynBio community.