September 16, 2012 | Read Time: 1 minute
New role: On November 1, Maria C. Freire will assume leadership of the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health, which raises private money to support the federal agency’s biomedical research and training of research scientists. In the past 16 years, the foundation has raised more than $610-million.
Career highlights: Ms. Freire worked at the NIH from 1995 to 2001 as director of the office that oversees all patenting and licensing for inventions developed by the NIH and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. She left to lead the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development. Since 2008 Ms. Freire, who is in her 50s, has been president of the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation, which supports biomedical research.
Education: She received her bachelor’s degree from Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, in Lima, Peru, and her Ph.D. in biophysics from the University of Virginia.
Why she was hired: In addition to her managerial and scientific background, Ms. Freire’s familiarity with the organization worked in her favor, says Charles Sanders, chairman of the foundation’s board. “She knows the NIH and the NIH knows her,” he says. “She doesn’t have a steep learning curve.”
Why she took the job: Getting foundations, companies, and other government agencies to finance research jointly appeals to Ms. Freire. “Science is not a one-off operation anymore,” she says. “Frankly, what you are seeing is the need for a matrix of different groups and people to accomplish a specific goal.”
Salary: She declined to reveal it.
Background: Ms. Freire was born in Lima and came to the United States on a Fulbright scholarship.
Book she’s currently reading: The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present, by Eric R. Kandel
