Caltech Biotechnology Club Career Series

Dr. Yu is a biotechnologist and entrepreneur with more than 12 years of experience in genomics and 27 years of experience in life sciences research. Before co-founding Epitomics, Dr. Yu served as Senior Vice-President of Research and Development at Mendel Biotechnology Inc. At Mendel Biotechnology, Dr. Yu established a robust functional genomics program and exceeded all six research agreement milestones with Monsanto and Savia. While at Mendel, Dr. Yu managed over 60 Ph.D. scientists and research associates.

Before joining Mendel Biotechnology, Dr. Yu worked with Human Genome Sciences Inc. (HGSI), a prominent genomics company, as one of the first senior scientists involved in the establishment of a high throughput gene discovery program. While at HGSI, Dr. Yu led the technology development group and the cancer group. His team identified and characterized numerous genes for therapeutic protein and drug discovery, one of which led to HGSI s first product launch, BENLYSTA® (belimumab), approved by the FDA for the treatment of lupas in 2011.

Additionally, Dr. Yu is the founder of the Chinese Biopharmaceutical Association headquartered in Washington, DC. He is co-inventor and co-author of over 100 patents and scientific articles. Dr. Yu was a Post-doctoral Fellow at Harvard Medical School. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Molecular Biology from Nobel Lauriat Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn s lab at the University of California, Berkeley, and has a B.S. degree in Biochemistry from Fudan University, Shanghai, China.