A Conversation with Dr. Baindu Bayon and Amie Bakare
Women in STEM
Dr. Baindu L. Bayon
Baindu L. Bayon, Ph.D. is a health scientist and AAAS Science and Technology Policy Executive Branch Fellow in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of the Director (OD) from Indianapolis, Indiana. She received her B.S in Biology from Indiana University Bloomington and her Ph.D. in Medical & Molecular Genetics from Indiana University School of Medicine with a focus on the neurogenetics of Alzheimer’s disease and transcription factor regulation of beta-secretase. She now lives in Rockville, Maryland and sits in the new NIH Small business Education and Entrepreneurial Development (SEED) Office in OD. Before joining SEED, she worked at the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) in the Division of Clinical Innovation (DCI) where she explored commercialization at CTSA (Clinical Translational Science Award) hubs. She has presented her work at several international conferences including the Drug Discovery and Therapy World Congress, the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Human Genetics, the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference, and Society for Neuroscience. Baindu has co-authored publications in several scientific journals, including Epigenomics, Plos One, and the American Journal of Medical Genetics. Baindu enjoys STEM outreach and driving youth toward solving problems with life science. She’s earned a myriad of awards throughout her career, including the coveted Indianapolis Business Journal’s Forty Under 40. She also has been named one of United Way of Central Indiana’s 100 Heroes and was among Junior Achievement of Central Indiana’s 2017 Indy’s Best and Brightest. Bayon currently serves as vice president of the Indiana University Neal Marshall Alumni Club National Board of Directors, the board of AWIS (Association for Women in Science) Bethesda, the advisory board of Nvolve, and is the current President-Nominee of the Downtown Silver Spring Rotary Club. She is passionate about the discovery, development, and commercialization of clinical innovations and in the success of biotechnology companies from ideation to launch.
Amie D Bakare
Amie D Bakare, M.I.S. is an IT professional and Data Visualization Platform SME for Eli Lilly and Company in Indianapolis, IN. She is a native hoosier and received her B.S. in Public Affairs from Indiana University Bloomington and her M.S. in Information Systems from Northwestern University with a specialization in Analytics and Business Intelligence. She has built her career mostly in healthcare analytics and has held roles such as a report developer and a platform support specialist. She is passionate about mentorship for other IT professionals as well as volunteering for programs that encourage more girls to seek STEM careers.
Jheel Patel
Co-Host and PhD Candidate Indiana University School of Medicine
Mark Kesling
Co-Host and Founder of The daVinci Pursuit
