Jieni Xu PhD, PMP

Senior Scientist, LNP Formulation

Jieni Xu has an entrepreneurial spirit and a strong need to see things though. A native of China, where she ranked number one in her class of 170 pharmacy majors when she received her B.A. from Shenyang Pharmaceutical University, Jieni moved to the US to pursue her PhD in pharmaceutical sciences from the University of Pittsburg. Following graduation, Jieni successfully applied her academic knowledge at a contract research organization (CRO). But after several interesting feasibility projects for name-brand global pharma and biotech companies, her natural thirst for completion remained unquenched when the application of her formulation work was transferred to the client. They rarely, if ever, shared the results of her work, not even whether it meant a successful or failed endpoint. Without such knowledge, there was no way to learn from one experiment to the next, optimize your results, or grow as a scientist; you just don’t have visibility to do your best work. She jumped at the chance to apply her skills at Kernal. It checked all the right boxes: a curious, close-knit team working together on really cool science; iterating to see what works and what doesn’t; with super-fast turn-around times. Plus, the potential of mRNA is huge – they’ll develop a platform, then plug-and-play for different targets. At Kernal, everything aligns perfectly with her goals. Jieni will be able to see how her work benefits patients and will someday run her own biotech startup. To make sure she’s prepared, she’s pursuing an MBA at Boston University with a concentration in health science entrepreneurship.