Harvard Grid Lab-to-Launch Lounge October 22 2026

This isn't your typical tech talk – it's an intimate, informal conversation where you'll hear directly from PhD founders about their journey from the lab bench to launching cutting-edge genomics startups. Pizza dinner included! The speakers will share: Their path from lab bench to creating a company What would they do differently Answers to your most pressing questions Don’t miss this chance to connect, ask questions, and explore founder pathways to success. Grab a bite, join the discussion, meet people working on exciting projects, and leave with new insights. Open to the Harvard community. Speakers and company profiles: Yunha Hwang, PhD Yunha Hwang, PhD is the co-founder and Chief Scientist of Tatta Bio, a scientific non-profit dedicated to advancing artificial intelligence models and tools to accelerate biology research. Tatta Bio brings together computer scientists and biologists to solve the fundamental challenge of interpreting genomes—the "source code" of biology—by developing state-of-the-art genomic language models (such as gLM2) and open sequence-analysis platforms like SeqHub. Yunha received her Ph.D. in Biology from Harvard University and her B.S. in Computer Science from Stanford University. She is currently an Assistant Professor at MIT across Biology, EECS, and the Schwarzman College of Computing, where her research focuses on applying machine learning to unlock microbial diversity for sustainable biosolutions. Jiang He, PhD Jiang He, PhD is a co-founder and Vice President at Vizgen, a pioneering spatial biology company leading the next frontier of multi-omics innovation. Vizgen’s flagship MERSCOPE® Platform leverages high-fidelity MERFISH technology and AI-driven spatial image analysis to deliver quantitative single-cell spatial genomics data, helping researchers uncover deep insights into human biology and complex disease mechanisms. Jiang received his Ph.D. from Harvard University, where he conducted research in Dr. Xiaowei Zhuang's lab co-inventing the foundational technology behind Vizgen, and completed postdoctoral research at MIT. He has been recognized in Forbes 30 Under 30 in Healthcare, was Harvard's graduate commencement speaker in 2016, named a STAT Wunderkind, and selected as an Aspen Institute Spotlight Health Scholar. FIRST COME, FIRST SERVE Seating at all events is on a first come, first serve basis. RSVPs are encouraged so we have an accurate headcount for classroom size and catering purposes. ACCESSIBILITY STATEMENT The Harvard Grid welcomes attendees of all abilities to our events. If you would like to request accommodations or have questions about physical access, please contact grid@harvard.edu in advance of the event. FUTURE COMMUNICATIONS Please note: By registering, you agree to receive emails about this event and future communications from the Harvard Grid.