Risini Weeratna, PhD

Dr. Risini Weeratna is the Director of the Disruptive Technology Solutions for Cell and Gene Therapy Program at Human Health Therapeutics Research Center of the National Research Council Canada. In this role, she provides scientific leadership and strategic vision for the Program which is aimed at developing innovative technologies to help enable affordable engineered cell and gene therapies for chronic diseases and rare genetic disorders affecting Canadians, and coordinating a national effort to increase accessibility of these therapies. Prior to joining the NRC, Dr. Weeratna was a Senior Principal Scientist at Pfizer Vaccine Research and Associate Director, Pharmacology at Coley Pharmaceutical Group.

Dr. Weeratna is a Fulbright and a Killam scholar with 25+ years’ experience in the biopharmaceutical industry and holds a MSc in bacteriology from University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA and PhD in microbiology/immunology from Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia, Canada.