Alix Fellows — Class of 2020
Alix Ventures — Supporting Early Stage Life Science Startups Driving Patient Impact 🚀
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After receiving over 500+ applications, conducting countless interviews, & much deliberation we are excited to announce Alix Venture’s Class of 2020 Fellowship Recipients! Welcome to the family folks, we look forward to having you a part of the team & sharing the journey ahead!
Joy Jin
Joy Jin is an early-stage healthcare entrepreneur and cancer biologist.
Joy was a John Harvard Scholar (top 5% of her class) at Harvard University, where she graduated Advanced Standing and magna cum laude with an A.B. in Molecular and Cellular Biology. There, she led Harvard Ventures, the largest entrepreneurship club on campus, and captained the Harvard Figure Skating team.
While in college, Joy was employee #3 of WntRx Pharmaceuticals, a Harvard Medical School and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute spinout that developed stapled peptide therapeutics to treat solid tumor cancers. There, Joy directed preclinical research, publishing a co-first author paper in Science Advances and presenting at the podium at the AACR Annual Meeting. She also led fundraising efforts, wrote numerous NIH SBIR grants, and started and managed the intern program, overseeing 19 employees. She has published 13 peer-reviewed research papers related to lung and colorectal cancers.
After graduation, Joy worked at Nest.Bio Ventures, an early-stage biotech fund based out of MIT, before starting at the UCSF School of Medicine, where she is currently an M.D. candidate.
Outside of work, Joy enjoys figure skating and traveling to judge competitions, writing, and curating her favorite places to eat with friends.
Jessica DeVilla
Jessica DeVilla is a student at Harvard studying Bioengineering, and Global Health who is passionate about medical innovation and the development of healthcare solutions for low resource communities.
She first became interested in the life sciences/healthcare industry through her work at Stony Brook Medicine in researching molecular and cellular changes that occur during colorectal and breast cancer metastasis, to enable more effective cancer treatment methods. At Harvard, Jessica has been active in several research efforts in the development of healthcare products in fields ranging from synthetic biology to mechanical engineering. Most recently, she’s been a leader in a project collaboration with the SaveLIFE Foundation in India to develop a low-cost driver drowsiness monitor and alert device using radar technology. Currently, she works in a photomedicine lab at Massachusetts General Hospital studying immune-cell infiltration in pancreatic tumors in response to photodynamic therapy.
On campus, Jessica is the co-president of Harvard Ventures, the College’s premier undergraduate organization for students interested in startups and venture capital. Through HV, she works to demystify and encourage active, informed, and meaningful participation in startups and venture capital within the Harvard community. Jessica is also the director of the Boston Chapter of Makergirl, a nonprofit dedicated to inspiring young girls to be active in STEM.
Jessica is most excited about the development of novel drug delivery methods, and startups that leverage technology to limit inequities in healthcare.
Outside of work and school, Jessica loves to dance in styles which include ballet, tap, hiphop, and lyrical, and play the violin.
Amanda Tu
Amanda Tu is a human-centered designer, strategist, and researcher passionate about healthcare and the life sciences.
Amanda spent her undergrad career studying the intersections of design, engineering, and public health abroad. Her favorite projects include developing a low-cost home care bed for a durable medical equipment company in South India and designing a solution to reduce the incidence of retained surgical gauze in Ethiopian hospitals. She is also passionate about cultivating young entrepreneurs, having held positions across multiple healthcare VC firms and startup accelerators.
Born in Boston and raised in Kentucky, Amanda studied Product Design at Stanford University, where she led marketing for the student entrepreneurship group BASES and spent most of her evenings prototyping in the d.school.
Her other interests include comedy, gardening, and indoor cycling.
Dennis Gong
Dennis is an aspiring physician innovator with a passion for cutting edge life sciences technologies.
He is currently a student at Johns Hopkins University, studying Biomedical Engineering and Applied Mathematics. Dennis has conducted research in drug delivery, biomaterials, and cancer immunology and is also the director of MedHacks, the nation’s premier medical hackathon at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. He also aids the commercialization of translational research at Johns Hopkins Tech Ventures. Previously, he worked at Kubanda Cryotherapy, a veterinary health startup providing safer cryotherapy treatment as an alternative to surgical resection for small tumors and masses. Dennis helped Kubanda secure over 300k in non dilutive grant and business competition funding.
He is most excited by companies that integrate an engineering mindset to solve biological problems, whether it be AI powered drug discovery, CAR-T platforms, or gene editing technologies.
When not thinking about the next frontier in medicine, Dennis can be found playing tennis, shooting basketballs, or in deep thought at the chess board.
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