While Angela Yen, Ph.D., originally trained as a computer scientist, she always dreamed of working on treatments that could improve the lives of patients. This inspired her to complete her master’s and doctorate in computational biology at MIT and the Broad Institute and to then join Vertex Pharmaceuticals as a computational genomics scientist.
Yen is now the vice president of data and computational sciences at Vertex in Boston. Her data and computational sciences team leads the development and application of artificial intelligence and advanced analytics across the global research portfolio to answer critical scientific questions. The team’s work spans across many technologies and areas, including computational chemistry, genomics, imaging, machine learning, statistics, integrative data science and biopharmaceutics modeling. For example, Yen’s team previously led the development of the computational framework used to evaluate on-target and off-target gene editing for the company’s cell and gene therapy programs.
Previously named a Rising Star by the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association, Yen was also a Siebel scholar, Google Anita Borg scholar, United States Presidential scholar and STAT wunderkind. Her work has been published in The New England Journal of Medicine, Nature and Cell.
Yen is not only a rock star computational scientist, but she is also a highly effective, intelligent and engaging colleague. She brings passion, intellect and enthusiasm to every project she works on and possesses a deep understanding of the drug development process. She is humble and considerate, yet bold and audacious when defending a scientific argument. Yen sets a high bar for what’s possible.