neurology
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Samantha Scott
Samantha Scott, PhD is the founder and CEO of JuneBrain, a Baltimore medtech startup building the first wearable, technician-free retinal scanning system. Trained as a biomedical engineer at Stanford and USC, she is turning high-resolution eye imaging plus AI into a way to detect and monitor brain and eye conditions far outside the walls of a clinic. JuneBrain has raised more than $3 million in private capital, won $3 million in NSF grants, holds four issued patents, and is on track for an FDA submission.
Christopher Reyes
Christopher Reyes is a biophysicist turned serial biotech entrepreneur and the CEO, co-founder, and director of Bloom Science, a San Diego company developing living medicines that harness the gut-brain axis. Bloom's lead program, BL-001, is a first-in-class oral live biotherapeutic designed to replicate the anti-seizure effects of the ketogenic diet, built on technology licensed from UCLA. With a PhD in biophysics from UCSF and a track record that includes a fast-acquired cancer startup, Reyes is betting that genetically optimized gut bacteria can treat pharmacoresistant neurological diseases.
David Matthews
David Matthews, PhD, is Chief Business Officer at Beacon Biosignals, the computational neurodiagnostics company turning EEG brain data into AI-powered biomarkers for neurological and psychiatric disease. A computational neuroscientist by training, he spent two decades moving between the lab, the boardroom, and the market - from NIH- and NSF-funded research at the Salk Institute to a partnership at Boston Consulting Group to commercial leadership at digital-health platform BrightInsight. He now drives partnerships and commercial growth at a company betting that the brain can be measured at home, at scale.
Ilise Lombardo
Ilise Lombardo is the CEO of Noema Pharma, a Basel-based clinical-stage biotech advancing treatments for central nervous system disorders. A Yale-trained psychiatrist with a Cambridge M.Phil and a Brown degree, she spent two decades in clinical practice and academia before co-founding Arvelle Therapeutics, which sold to Angelini Pharma for roughly $1 billion in 2021. She now steers Noema's pipeline of Phase 2 programs targeting Tourette syndrome, trigeminal neuralgia, tuberous sclerosis seizures and menopause-related CNS symptoms.
Elizabeth Burstein
Elizabeth Burstein is the CEO and co-founder of Neura Health, a virtual neurology clinic she started in 2020 after a two-year fight with a trapped nerve exposed how broken specialist access is in the United States. A Stanford computer-science-and-philosophy grad who built product at LinkedIn, Blue Apron, Zocdoc and Maven Clinic before turning founder, she has grown Neura to serve tens of thousands of patients and raised $22M+ in venture funding, including a $11.4M Series A in 2025 led by the American Heart Association's Go Red for Women Venture Fund.
Jonathan Root
Jonathan Root is a General Partner at U.S. Venture Partners (USVP) in Menlo Park, California, where he has invested in early-stage companies since 1997. A board-certified neurologist who spent nine years in clinical medicine - including as a Director of the Neurology-Neurosurgery ICU at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center - Root brings a rare clinician's lens to venture investing. He focuses on medical devices, biotech, and healthcare IT, with a portfolio that spans Omada Health, Carlsmed, Cleave Biosciences, and Inari Medical (acquired by Stryker in 2025). His guiding principle: 'The greatest idea in the world will not be successful if it's not practical.'
Sandy Macrae
Sandy Macrae is a Scottish physician-scientist who has led Sangamo Therapeutics, the Brisbane, California gene-editing pioneer, as President and CEO since June 2016. Trained at Glasgow and Cambridge - where Nobel laureate Sydney Brenner supervised his PhD - he ran emerging-markets R&D at GSK and was Global Medical Officer at Takeda before staking his career on zinc finger technology and genomic medicines for rare and neurological diseases.
J. Scott Zimmerman
J. Scott Zimmerman is the CEO and co-founder of Xola, a San Francisco-based SaaS platform that powers booking, back-office management, and marketing for tour and activity operators worldwide. A licensed physician who completed a neurology residency at Stanford, Zimmerman chose Stanford precisely for its proximity to Silicon Valley, coding in Python during spare hospital moments - sometimes until 2am - while simultaneously building the company that would become Xola. He founded Xola in fall 2011 after recognizing that real-time technology had transformed flight, hotel, and car rental reservations, but the $135 billion tours-and-activities market remained largely undigitized. Backed by investors including Rakuten Travel, Michael Burry (of 'The Big Short' fame), and Google Analytics co-creators Scott and Brett Crosby, Xola has grown to serve thousands of operators across North America, Western Europe, and beyond.