Prof. Polly Fordyce

Polly Fordyce is an Assistant Professor of Genetics and Bioengineering and fellow of the ChEM-H Institute at Stanford, where her laboratory focuses on developing and applying new microfluidic platforms for quantitative, high-throughput biophysics and biochemistry. She graduated from the University of Colorado at Boulder with undergraduate degrees in physics and biology before moving to Stanford University, where she earned a Ph.D. in physics for work with Professor Steve Block developing instrumentation and assays for single-molecule studies of kinesin motor proteins. For her postdoctoral research, she worked with Professor Joe DeRisi to develop a new microfluidic platform for understanding how transcription factors recognize and bind their DNA targets as well as a new technology for bead-based multiplexing. She is the recipient of a number of awards, including an NIH New Innovator Award, an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, a McCormick and Gabilan Fellowship, an NIH Pathway to Independence Award (K99/R00), and a Helen Hay Whitney Postdoctoral Fellowship, and was recently named a Chan Zuckerberg Biohub Investigator.

Dr. Sammy Datwani

Dr. Datwani joined Labcyte Inc., in 2007 and is responsible for leading internal research programs and managing the advanced developments for the creation of new products and capabilities for the company in the arena of acoustic droplet ejection. His interests are in the areas of leveraging microfluidics and liquid handling for advancing precision medicine, microbiome research, cancer research, single cell applications and integrating novel detection technologies to automate the laboratory. Dr. Datwani has over twenty years of experience directing, managing, inventing and applying cutting edge research and developments in both industry and academia. Prior to Labcyte Inc., Sammy was a Senior Scientist in the Advanced Technologies Group at Eksigent Technologies, LLC (now a Danaher Corp.) where he led the technical development for an integrated high-performance liquid chromatography on a chip. From 2000 – 2003, Sammy held the position of R&D Engineer in the Advanced Technology Group at Caliper Life Sciences (now part of Perkin Elmer) and spearheaded the development of the several LabChip devices as well as the Library Card which married high throughput drug discovery on a microfluidic chip with a high-density reagent storage array.

Sammy’s professional activities include election to the Class of 2018 College of Fellows of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers, serving as an invited judge for the Society for Lab Automation and Screening (SLAS) Innovation Award (2012-2019), invited Track Chair for the SLAS conference (2019), invited Associate Track Chair for SLAS (2018), invited Session Chair for the SLAS conference (2017-2018), invited to the National Academy of Science: Arab-American Frontiers of Science Symposium (2017, 2018), invited to the National Academy of Engineering: US-China Frontiers in Engineering program (2017), invited to the National Academy of Engineering: Global Grand Challenges Summit (2017), nominated to the National Academy of Engineering: US Frontiers of Engineering program (2016), invited to the NIH for SBIR/STTR Grant Panel Review (4 invitations and 4 honorariums) (2014-2017), invited to the SLAS Leadership Forum (2015-2018), invited industrial evaluator (SJSU), Faculty member in the Dept. Biomedical, Chemical and Materials Engineering at SJSU (2011-present), invited lecturer in Microfluidics (UC Berkeley), frequent scientific journal reviewer, organizer and chair of scientific sessions at international meetings with over 60 presentations, publications and patents.