Our Team

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Jill Pecon-Slattery

CEO and Founder

Jill began her career as a field researcher interested in unraveling the ecological mysteries of marine life using genetic tools.

A subsequent post-doctoral fellowship formed the basis of her research for the next twenty years at the National Cancer Institute-National Institutes of Health. There she served as lead investigator for multiple projects using the latest advances in genomic technologies to sequence the DNA of 100’s of species and their pathogens.

Her research bridged traditional philosophical gaps between human biomedicine and wildlife biodiversity through the study of DNA, the basic building block of all biological function and disease.

Jill’s publications track the insights only possible through the application of cutting-edge technology to investigate the function of genes and genomes within and between species. This exclusive knowledge and rich expertise drives Cornerstone Genomics R&D and forms the innovative foundation of the 2019 SBIR Phase I and the 2020 SBIR Phase II awards from the National Science Foundation.

In addition to her role as president of a woman-owned small company, Jill is affiliate faculty at Colorado State University and Research Associate at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute. She serves on Editorial Review Boards for scientific journals, enjoys presenting research as invited speaker, and developing exciting new workshops and training in genomic technologies for researchers in human genomics and disease; comparative and evolutionary genomics; systems biology; animal health and veterinary sciences; and wildlife biodiversity and conservation.

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Devon O’Rourke

COO

Devon joined the Cornerstone Genomics team in early 2021. With a range of wet-bench and bioinformatic skills accrued through post-doctoral and graduate projects, he ensures that complex computational tasks are rooted in a meaningful biological context.

His research spanned a range of genomics disciplines: population genetics using whole-exome sequencing; vertebrate genome assembly using long and linked-read technologies (Nanopore, HiC, 10x); mammalian genome and transcriptome annotations; diet ecology using amplicon metabarcoding.

Prior to attending the University of New Hampshire for his Ph.D, Devon spent six years as a science teacher (plus another year obtaining a Masters in Education), gaining valuable experiences in both science communication and cross-disciplinary approaches to problem solving.

In his free time, you can find Devon hiking or surfing with his family around their home on Cape Cod, MA, USA.

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Susan Hernandez

Lead Developer

Susan serves as our lead developer, managing the full complement of front and back end tasks.

Susan brings a wide range of skills from her diverse development career supporting private companies, Microsoft Gold Certified Partners, and Government contractors. From database design, to project architecture, to data analysis, to front end visualizations and presentation, Susan has worked closely with the a wide range of layers within the development stack. This allows her to have a more broad view of an application as a whole, ensuring that each piece of the system works within the overarching project, and is designed with the customer’s needs in mind at all stages.

Susan has also provided in-person and virtual technical training, and presented at SPUG (SharePoint User Groups) in the DC area. She is a strong proponent of development tools and frameworks, such as Agile and Scrum, which focus on the customer, and on quickly responding to customers’ evolving needs and market developments. She has worked closely with customers, analysts, and stakeholders on projects of multiple complexities, and enjoys finding solutions that exceed expectations and provide innovative, new ways to address business problems.

Outside the office, Susan enjoys spending her time focusing on music and creative writing.