David J. Galas, PhD, is Senior vice President and Professor at the Institute for Systems Biology, Seattle Washington, an independent research institute. He was previously Chancellor, Chief Scientific Officer and Norris Professor of Applied Life Science at the Keck Graduate Institute of Applied Life Sciences (KGI). Before founding KGI, Dr. Galas served as President and Chief Scientific Officer of Seattle-based Chiroscience R&D Inc., a genomics and drug discovery company formed through the acquisition of Darwin Molecular Corporation, which Dr. Galas co-founded. Dr. Galas served as Director for Health and Environmental Research at the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science, where he headed the DOE's Human Genome Project from 1990 to 1993, on leave from the University of Southern California, where he was Professor of Molecular Biology for twelve years, and directed the Molecular Biology section of the Biological Science Department.

Dr. Galas' received his PhD in physics from the University of California, Davis-Livermore, and his undergraduate degree in physics from the University of California, Berkeley. He is the recipient of several awards including the Smithsonian Institution-Computer World Pioneer award in 1999, and has served on federal, university and corporate boards and advisory committees, including the National Research Council Board on Life Science, the Board of Directors of the Hertz Foundation, and the National Cancer Policy Board. He is a lifetime National Associate of the National Academy of Sciences.