Page 24 - Heroes of Chemistry Program Booklet

Kevin Gurney
Kevin Gurney received his Ph.D. in Microbiology and Immunology from UCLA in 2002 and worked
at several biopharma companies. After leading potency assay development teams at Merck,
Gurney recently joined a start up cell therapy company as Vice President at Thunder Biotech
leading Regulatory and Development efforts.

Brad Holstine
Since joining Merck in 2001, Brad has commercialized products across small molecule, vaccine and
biologics modalities, and supported manufacturing facilities around the globe. Brad is currently
Executive Director, Site Technology Lead at Merck’s Durham, NC manufacturing plant. He earned
his B.S. and M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Drexel University.

Beth Junker
Beth Junker is currently a Principal Consultant and Owner of Bioprocess Advantage LLC. She holds
a Ph.D. in Biochemical Engineering from MIT and a B.S.E. in Chemical Engineering from
Princeton University. After working at Merck for over 27 years, she now performs CMC technical
& strategic consulting in several product modalities.

Sunitha Kandula
Sunitha Kandula is the Director at Downstream Process Development, Biologics Process R&D,
Merck Research Labs in Kenilworth, New Jersey. Sunitha is focusing on new modality molecules
and non-platform processes and has experience in early, late stage and commercial space
with BMS and Sanofi. Sunitha holds a Ph.D. is Biotechnology from India with a postdoc from
Korea and Canada.

Thomas Linden
Thomas is currently VP & Head of Biologics Process Development at Takeda Pharmaceuticals based
in Boston, MA. He had prior tenures at Novartis and Merck Co. Inc., working on the development
of various biopharmaceuticals and vaccines. He holds a M.S. and Ph.D. equivalent degree in
Biochemistry and was born in Germany.

24 #HeroesofChemistry | 2021 Recipients