Una Ryan

Una Ryan (born December 18, 1941) is a British-American biologist who has conducted research on vascular biology, publishing over 300 papers. After an extended research and academic career she began a career in the biotech industry. She was Director for Health Sciences of Monsanto; CEO, president and director of AVANT Immunotherapeutics; and is currently the chairman of The Bay Area BioEconomy Initiative, among many other associations. She is an angel investor and focuses her funds on women-led companies. She has won numerous awards and recognition during her career including the National Institutes of Health's 10-year merit award, Order of the British Empire and the Albert Einstein Award.

Biography Una Scully was born on December 18, 1941 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to a British father who was interned in a Japanese camp during World War II. Scully and her mother fled by boat from Singapore to England, where she completed her education, graduating with a degree in zoology from the University of Bristol in 1963. In 1965, she began publishing under the name of Una Smith and did so until 1973. She went on to complete a PhD at the University of Cambridge in 1967 and that same year moved to the United States, taking up a Howard Hughes Fellowship at the University of Miami to study angiotensin-converting enzymes. In 1975, her professional publishing reflected her name as U. S. Ryan or Una Scully Ryan. Her work at Miami was recognized by a 10-year Merit Award from the National Institutes of Health. In 1996, Ryan was promoted to President at AVANT and also began serving as chief executive officer and President of Celldex Therapeutics Inc., Unable to secure venture capital funds for the program, Ryan turned her focus toward a program called Diagnostics for All, in an attempt to provide inexpensive diagnostic tests to developing countries. The innovation used paper tests and a drop of blood which when chemicals were applied would change color to indicate different results, without lab work required and simple disposal, as the paper could be burned. The company began with liver testing and then expanded their products to include pregnancy tests and a glucose monitoring test for diabetics.

Deciding to relocate to the American west coast in 2013, Ryan accepted a position as the first woman to chair the Bay Area BioEconomy Initiative. While she was in Boston, Ryan had served on the board of the Biotechnology Industry Organization and the BioEconomy Initiative had similar aims of increasing efficiency and decreasing the time it takes for products to begin clinical trials and ultimately get to medical professionals. She also turned her focus to angel investing in an attempt to help women-run businesses find venture capital funds. Ryan served as managing director of Golden Seeds, as a partner in Astia Angel and participated with The Angel Forum all aimed at investing in startups and mentoring businesses in the Silicon Valley. She continues to serve on the boards of several biotechnology firms.

In 2015, Ryan launched ULUX fine art based on her electron micrographs. Ryan has two daughters andfour grandchildren.

Selected works