SynBioBeta Speaker
David Hallett
Recursion
CSO
Dave Hallett comes to Recursion after approximately 5 years as the Chief Scientific Officer and Interim CEO of Exscientia. David Hallett, Ph.D., is an experienced “drug hunter” with over 20 years’ track record leading successful teams and driving major strategic collaborations. Prior to joining Exscientia, from 2005 to 2019 he held various positions within Evotec including Executive Vice President of Chemistry and EVP of Alliance Management. Dr. Hallett trained as a medicinal chemist and served as a Research Fellow at Merck & Co., Inc. He holds a B.A. from the University of Cambridge in Natural Sciences, a Ph.D. from the University of Manchester in Synthetic Organic Chemistry and was a post-doctoral fellow in Synthetic Organic Chemistry at the University of Texas Austin.
SynBioBeta 2026 Tickets are Live
Confirmed Speakers
Sessions Featuring
David
This Year
•
-
Human Health
From Cells to Patients: Solving the Scale Mismatch in Virtual Biology
Drug discovery often measures biology at the cell level, while therapies must ultimately work across tissues, organs, and whole patients. This scale mismatch means that even highly accurate cellular predictions can fail to translate in the clinic. This session explores strategies to bridge that gap. How do we connect single-cell dynamics to organ-level physiology and patient outcomes? How do we preserve biological context while scaling models? And how do we ensure that virtual biology does not stop at simulation, but informs real therapeutic decisions? Speakers will discuss multiscale modeling that links molecular and cellular systems to higher-order biology; spatial and high-dimensional phenotypic data that retain context; and integrated computational–experimental loops that translate cellular signals into clinically meaningful biomarkers. Together, we ask: how do we ensure virtual biology reflects not just what cells do in isolation, but how biology behaves in the full complexity of patients?
Get a Ticket
Featuring
Marc Tessier-Lavigne
Xaira
Chairman & CEO
Neuroscience pioneer and former Stanford president building AI biotech.
Kim Branson
GlaxoSmithKline
SVP, Global Head
Drug-discovery AI architect turning data into medicines.
David Hallett
Recursion
CSO
Veteran “drug hunter” leading Recursion’s industrialized, AI-driven discovery.
Ron Alfa
NOETIK Inc.
Co-Founder & CEO
Physician-scientist and Recursion veteran building AI cancer therapeutics.
•
-
Human Health
From Cells to Patients: Solving the Scale Mismatch in Virtual Biology
Drug discovery often measures biology at the cell level, while therapies must ultimately work across tissues, organs, and whole patients. This scale mismatch means that even highly accurate cellular predictions can fail to translate in the clinic. This session explores strategies to bridge that gap. How do we connect single-cell dynamics to organ-level physiology and patient outcomes? How do we preserve biological context while scaling models? And how do we ensure that virtual biology does not stop at simulation, but informs real therapeutic decisions? Speakers will discuss multiscale modeling that links molecular and cellular systems to higher-order biology; spatial and high-dimensional phenotypic data that retain context; and integrated computational–experimental loops that translate cellular signals into clinically meaningful biomarkers. Together, we ask: how do we ensure virtual biology reflects not just what cells do in isolation, but how biology behaves in the full complexity of patients?
Get a Ticket
Featuring
Marc Tessier-Lavigne
Xaira
Chairman & CEO
Neuroscience pioneer and former Stanford president building AI biotech.
Kim Branson
GlaxoSmithKline
SVP, Global Head
Drug-discovery AI architect turning data into medicines.
David Hallett
Recursion
CSO
Veteran “drug hunter” leading Recursion’s industrialized, AI-driven discovery.
Ron Alfa
NOETIK Inc.
Co-Founder & CEO
Physician-scientist and Recursion veteran building AI cancer therapeutics.
Session lineup still growing
Get a Ticket
Featuring
Speaker Coming Soon
•
-
Human Health
From Cells to Patients: Solving the Scale Mismatch in Virtual Biology
Drug discovery often measures biology at the cell level while interventions work at the tissue, organ, or whole-patient scale. This mismatch can make accurate cell-level predictions irrelevant in the clinic. This session dives into strategies to bridge that gap: multiscale modeling that nests single-cell dynamics within organ-level simulations, spatial transcriptomics that preserve context, and surrogate models that translate cell-level outputs into clinical biomarkers. Speakers will ask: how do we ensure virtual biology reflects not just what cells do in isolation, but how biology behaves in the real complexity of patients?
Get a Ticket
Featuring
Speaker Coming Soon
