Our Team
Many Backgrounds. Different Perspectives. Persistently Curious.
MEET THE TEAM
MATT STANTON, PhD
Venture Partner
KATIE DAHLSTROM
Vice President, Development Strategy & Operations
ALEX MILLER, PhD
Senior Associate
JOEL C. BARRISH, Ph.D.
Venture Partner
JOEY O'NEILL
Senior Associate, Investor Services
JACQUELINE RHUDA
Analyst, Quantitative Research & Strategy
MATT STANTON, PhD
Venture Partner
Matt Stanton is a Venture Partner at RA Ventures (Raven), focusing on new company creation, specifically therapeutic project concepts. Matt brings to Raven more than 25 years of scientific leadership experience in pharma and biotech. Prior to Raven, he spent 7 years at Generation Bio, first as Chief Technology Officer and for the past 5 years as Chief Scientific Officer. At Generation, Matt was responsible for developing the core technologies aimed at non-viral gene therapy/editing and more recently, T cell delivery of siRNA cargo for the treatment of auto-immune disease. In addition, he was intimately involved in all aspects of fundraising from series A through to a successful IPO and follow on funding. Matt spent time overseeing business development and helped to secure a thriving partnership with Moderna. Prior to Generation, he was Vice President and Head of Chemistry at Moderna Therapeutics. There, Matt’s team identified proprietary lipid nanoparticles for vaccine development and helped to put the first mRNA vaccines into clinical development. His team discovered sm-102, the key lipid component in SpikeVax. Prior to Moderna, Matt was head of siRNA chemistry at Merck, overseeing delivery chemistry and nucleotide chemistry. In all, Matt was with Merck for over 16 years, which included roles in chemistry technology development, Process chemistry and small molecule medicinal chemistry. Matt obtained his PhD at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his bachelor’s degree at Virginia Tech.
KATIE DAHLSTROM
Vice President, Development Strategy & Operations
Katie Dahlstrom is Vice President, Development Strategy & Operations at Raven. Katie's primary responsibilities at Raven are to lead the development and oversee the implementation of best practices in clinical strategies in RA Capital Management's newcos and portfolio companies. Katie was previously Vice President of Clinical Development Operations at Theseus Pharmaceuticals where she built the development operations organization and executed the early-stage oncology portfolio. Before Theseus, she held increasing levels of responsibility in Clinical Operations at Agios Pharmaceuticals where she oversaw the operational execution of the TIBSOVO® (ivosidenib) program for R/R AML from IND to NDA and the PYRUKIND® (mitapivat) program for pyruvate kinase deficiency from Phase 2 to NDA. Katie has prior clinical operations experience from Takeda Oncology and pharmacovigilance experience from Genzyme, a Sanofi Company. Katie has a BS in Biology from Stonehill College and an MA in Clinical Investigation from Boston University Medical School.
ALEX MILLER, PhD
Senior Associate
Alex Miller is a Senior Associate with the TechAtlas division of RA Capital Management. His primary responsibilities are to work closely with members of the investment team and portfolio companies to deeply understand competitive landscapes, evaluate investment opportunities in a variety of therapeutic areas across all stages from discovery and new company creation through commercialization, and advise portfolio companies on program and pipeline strategy. Alex holds a BS in Engineering Sciences in Bioengineering from Harvard University and a PhD in Medical Engineering and Medical Physics from the Harvard-MIT Health Sciences and Technology (HST) Program.
JOEL C. BARRISH, Ph.D.
Venture Partner
Joel is currently a Venture Partner at Raven and the President and Chief Scientific Officer at Jnana Therapeutics, a company focused on unlocking hard-to-drug targets, including solute carrier proteins (SLCs). Prior to Jnana, Joel served as Chief Scientific Officer at Achillion Pharmaceuticals, where he led discovery efforts on Factor D inhibitors for the treatment of Paroxysmal Nocturnal Hemoglobinuria and C3 Glomerulopathy. Most of Joel’s career was spent as a medicinal chemist in pharma, where he capped a 28-year career at Bristol-Myers Squibb by spending the last five years as Vice President and Head of Discovery Chemistry, working across all therapeutic areas. In that role, Joel worked with teams responsible for advancing more than 40 compounds into clinical development, including Sprycel (dasatinib), which he co-invented. While at BMS, Joel and his colleagues made notable advances in the area of kinase inhibitor drug discovery, particularly in immunology and oncology. He is a co-author on over 130 peer reviewed publications and is a co-inventor on 40 issued U.S. patents. Prior to moving to BMS, he spent five years at Hoffmann La-Roche as a research scientist. Joel received his doctorate in Organic Chemistry from Columbia University and his bachelor’s in Chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania.
JOEY O'NEILL
Senior Associate, Investor Services
Joey O’Neill is a Senior Associate, Investor Services at RA Capital Management. Joey’s primary responsibility is to manage workflows for investor transaction processing and investor reporting in collaboration with the fund’s administrator. Joey previously served as Private Client Associate at Bernstein Private Wealth Management. Prior to Bernstein, Joey held a Consultant role at FactSet. Joey holds a BS in Finance from American University. He is FINRA-certified in Series 7, Series 63 and Securities Industry Essentials.
JACQUELINE RHUDA
Analyst, Quantitative Research & Strategy
Jacqueline Rhuda is an Analyst, Quantitative Research & Strategy at RA Capital Management. Jacqueline’s primary responsibility is to partner with the Investment Team to develop quantitative analyses that inform investment decisions and improve core processes throughout the firm. While at Johns Hopkins, she spent two years as a Research Intern and Teaching Assistant in the Department of Biology and the Department of Chemistry. Jacqueline holds a BS with a double major in Molecular and Cellular Biology & Earth and Planetary Sciences from Johns Hopkins University.