Team

Alec completed his PhD in Biomedical Engineering at Brown University, where he studied interactions between bacterial infections and skin to develop smart wound-dressing biomaterials. His research was supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Alongside his doctoral work, he focused on translating university IP from lab to market. He trained as a Brown Technology Innovations Fellow in IP evaluation and commercialization strategy and pursued venture development through The Engine Blueprint accelerator and the NSF I-Corps New England Hub, where he also served as a teaching assistant. Alec earned his B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from Arizona State University, with minors in Business and Chemistry, and is an inventor on patented technology spun out from Arizona State University.

William is a biomedical engineer with medical device product development experience at Integra LifeSciences, where he led cross-functional implementation, usability validation, and quality execution under ISO and EU MDR frameworks. He earned his B.S. in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and completed his Master's at Brown University, where his work centered around neuroengineering, product development, and medtech commercialization strategy. Earlier in his career, he interned at an orthopedic startup under Dr. Manuel DaSilva, gaining early exposure to surgeon-driven innovation. He also served as a graduate healthcare research analyst for the Brown Investment Group, leading scientific and commercial diligence on emerging life science companies, and participated in the NSF I-Corps program. William is also a Senior Fellow for No Patient Left Behind.

Anita Shukla is the Elaine I. Savage Professor of Engineering at Brown University and co-inventor of the core smart technology underlying Red Maple's platform. Her research focuses on nano to macroscale biomaterials for treating bacterial and fungal infections, work she leads through the Shukla Lab at Brown. She is a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE), an NSF CAREER award, and an Office of Naval Research Early Career Grant, and is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering. She holds a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.S. in chemical engineering and biomedical engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.