Jean E. Schelhorn (PhD, Chemistry) has a background in industry, contract R&D, nonprofits, and academia. An inventor on 12 US patents and additional associated foreign patents, she was a research and capital projects director for a $1B business unit at Owens-Corning, a VP for Intellectual Property Strategy and Development for Battelle Memorial Institute, and Associate Vice President for Technology Licensing and Commercialization at the Ohio State University. She currently serves as the Director of Commercialization and Industry Collaborations for the College of Veterinary Medicine at the Ohio State University, and consults with entrepreneurs world-wide.
Joan M. Herbers (PhD, Biological Sciences) is Professor and Dean Emeritus at the Ohio State University. Over a 40-year career, she has garnered more than $15M in grants to support her research and published more than 100 articles and a book. In mid-career, she pivoted from studying social insects to developing expertise on gender issues in science. She was the lead on a $5M project at Ohio State which developed the first-ever program specifically targeting women scientists interested in commercialization, and is Past-President of the Association for Women in Science.
Jean and Joan
Schelhorn and Herbers have been collaborators beyond Beyond Discovery. They have collaborated on a project funded by the Kauffman Foundation to provides individualized support and training to women scientists entering the world of commercialization throughout the US. Both have been members of an angel investment consortium. And most importantly, they have known each other since graduate school at Northwestern University, where their intramural sports team (the Vitamin Bs) won several championships.
Mike Gegenheimer (J.D.) is an engineer and lawyer. After spending 7 years in engineering and science, Mike has served over 32 years as an intellectual property attorney, strategist and corporate officer specializing in Intellectual Property development and commercialization. Mike helps to define and implement high-margin business/IP strategies in high technology areas for large and small publicly traded clients. He has served as in-house global IP Director and VP for Owens-Corning; CEO and General Counsel of Owens Corning Integrex; Chief IP Counsel for Battelle Memorial Institute; and currently serves as VP, Assistant General Counsel and Chief IP Counsel at Enveric Biosciences, while also consulting with innovators and early-stage businesses on IP matters.
Megan Brown graduated with a fine arts degree from the Columbus College of Art and Design and offered her art interpretation of the process of discovery and maturation to inventions/technology and upward movement for the cover of Beyond Discovery. And beyond that Megan wants us to highlight that she is an accomplished APDT CCPDT-KA dog trainer, and an agility competitor with 4 dogs. She works in all forms of painting and ceramics, and loves creative challenges.
Daniel Held is a photographer based out of Columbus, Ohio. He has a background in mechanical engineering, graduating magna cum laude and then working in the aerospace industry. He switched careers to pursue his passion for photography, where he specializes in working with innovative companies and individuals to advance their products and ideas. When not creating photographs, he enjoys time with his beautiful wife and daughter, along with their three well-mannered cats.
Mike Coutinho has worked in the tech transfer industry since 2000, working at Battelle Memorial Institute, The Ohio State University’s Tech Transfer Office, and finally at a startup based on software he wrote. Innovate IP was an Ohio State startup founded to help manage intellectual property for universities, labs, hospitals, and companies. Mike is very proud that many of the best universities in the industry were interested in the platform he developed. He is especially proud that The Ohio State University, Duke University, Washington University in St. Louis, and Nationwide Children’s Hospital were early adopters of the platform. Innovate IP was acquired by Cayuse in 2020 and rebranded as their Innovation platform. Mike continues to be involved with startups and is currently working as a database engineer.