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Kelly Knee, PhD

Kelly Knee, PhD headshot
Kelly Knee, PhD

Senior Director of Translational Research

Prior to joining FAST, Kelly spent nearly 15 years in research and development, most recently as the Senior Director of Translational Neuroscience and Drug Discovery at Atalanta Therapeutics. At Atalanta she led translational activities including qualification of clinical biomarkers and pre-clinical efficacy study design for projects targeting neurodegenerative and neurodevelopmental diseases.

Prior to Atalanta, Kelly spent more than a decade in the Pfizer Rare Disease Research Unit, progressing from Senior Scientist to Director of Translational Medicine. During her time at Pfizer, she served as biology lead for multiple pre-clinical and clinical projects targeting Sickle Cell Disease. As Director of Translational Medicine, she worked on clinical projects in rare hematology and nephrology and led natural history and patient registry projects in rare neurology, cardiology, and hematology, as part of the RDRU’s efforts to deliver better therapies to patients with rare diseases.

Kelly received a BA in biology from Alfred University (Alfred NY) and her PhD in molecular biophysics from Wesleyan University (Middletown CT), where she worked on the molecular mechanism of hemoglobin fiber formation in Sickle Cell Disease. She did her postdoctoral fellowship at MIT, co-advised by Jonathan King and David Housman, studying aggregation diseases.

Kelly is a member of the American Society of Hematology, where she serves on the childhood diseases committee, and the Biophysical Society, where she serves on the early careers committee. She has published multiple peer-reviewed papers and has been cited more than 250 times. She is also an adjunct lecturer at the University of Oxford and is part of the Structural Genomics Consortium.

Located in Boston, in her free time, Kelly is a patron of the Museum of Fine Arts and supports the MFA conservation department. She is also active in both Alfred and Wesleyan alumni groups. Her hobbies include searching for the ideal lobster roll, English riding, and exploring new parks with her dog Charlie.

A message from Kelly:

I am so excited to join the team at FAST! Helping bring new therapies to patients with rare diseases has been the focus of my scientific career, and I am passionate about the power of scientific collaboration to make a huge impact on patients’ lives. I know the need for therapies for Angelman syndrome is urgent, and I am ready to work with everyone at FAST to move things forward as quickly as possible.

Fun Fact:

Kelly and two of her labmates at MIT won the Foldit University Protein Folding challenge, by successfully using the Foldit software to optimize a protein. The prize was $5000 dollars and the glory of beating teams from MIT rivals Caltech and Harvard.

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