Pek Lum

Pek Lum has more than 20 years of genomics and drug discovery experience. She is the chief architect of the science behind Auransa’s technology, combining her deep understanding of genomics and her vast experience in applying data science in the pharmaceutical industry.

Before founding Auransa, Pek was an early employee and vice president of Product and chief data scientist for Ayasdi, where she created early business verticals and helped grow the company from a few people to several dozen employees. Pek started off her career at Rosetta Inpharmatics, a pioneer in genomics and microarray technology. When Rosetta was acquired by Merck, Pek continued to champion the integration of data science into traditional biology, contributing to Merck’s development pipeline. While at Merck, Pek held roles of increasing responsibility, including leading molecular profiling for the diabetes, cardiovascular and obesity franchises. Pek received her Ph.D. in yeast genetics at the University of Washington, Seattle. Her work has been widely published in scientific and medical journals, such as Nature and Cell, and her research has contributed to discoveries in drug development and the understanding of complex diseases. She has previously served as an advisor to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research and Resolution Bioscience, and is currently an advisor for Sequence Bio and Bayes Impact.