Dr. Duke is a biotechnology executive, inventor, biomedical researcher and serial entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience in building, financing and managing start-up biotechnology companies based on inventions made in Colorado’s non-profit research institutions.

Dr. Duke is currently founder and chief scientific officer of the Colorado Institute for Drug, Device and Diagnostic Development (CID4). Dr. Duke is a co-scientific founder and former chief executive officer of GlobeImmune (NASD: GBIM) and was involved in the formation and/or management of Newellink, ApopLogic Pharmaceuticals, Sierra Neuropharmaceuticals, MenoGeniX, PeptiVir and Aurora Oncology. These Colorado-based companies have raised more than $200 million in financing and have multiple products in phase I and II clinical trials. Dr. Duke has more than 30 years of experience in biomedical research and is a tenured faculty member in the Department of Medicine at the University of Colorado Denver. He has more than 70 research publications and his work on apoptosis was recognized as the cover article of “Scientific American”. He is a graduate of McGill University (B.Sc. and M.Sc.) and the University of Colorado (Ph.D.).

Dr. Woody Emlen is a graduate of Stanford University and the University of California (San Diego) School of Medicine.

Dr. Emlen was professor of medicine and immunology at the University of Washington and University of Colorado Health Sciences Center for almost 20 years, where his practice was in internal medicine and rheumatology (arthritis) and his research focused on inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. In the late 1990s, Dr. Emlen left academic medicine to pursue a career in biotechnology, serving as vice president of scientific affairs for Palo Alto-based InterMune Pharmaceuticals. In 2004, he co-founded his own Denver-based biotechnology company, Taligen Therapeutics, serving as chief operating officer until the company’s acquisition by Alexxion in 2011. Dr. Emlen is currently retired from medicine, but serves on the boards of several early-stage biotechnology companies.

Dr. Richard Fort began his career in the space shuttle program at Kennedy Space Center, where he worked for Martin Marietta, Lockheed and NASA in the areas of organizational development, leadership and total quality management.

He continued his career in the telecommunications industry with Time Warner Cable, then moved into the world of education when he bought a Sylvan Learning Center franchise. In 1995, Dr. Fort founded Education Sales Management (ESM), which quickly grew into the premier enrollment center for Sylvan franchises across the nation. ESM branched into higher education and became the leading provider of student enrollment services in the areas of college admissions and student retention. In 16 years, ESM worked with over 1,000 learning centers, college campuses and online programs, grew to 800 employees, and was acquired by the Xerox Corporation in 2011. Today, Dr. Fort runs The Fort Knocks Company, an investment management company focused on the life sciences and clean tech energy sectors. He advises start-ups and entrepreneurs, and sits on several boards of directors. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in psychology at Louisiana State University, a Master of Science in experimental psychology from Northeast Louisiana University, and his doctorate in organizational psychology from Walden University.