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BioLargo Water Team 

BioLargo Water has assembled a team of esteemed and experienced water treatment and technology experts, PhDs, engineers, and business development professionals. In addition, we're supported by more than 20 worldwide industry and academic collaborators.
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Richard Smith, Ph.D

President and CEO 

Dr. Smith oversees research and development efforts at BioLargo Water, and has been integral to the vision of the AOS from the beginning. Richard also has over ten years of experience as the Research Development and Industrial Relations Coordinator at the University of Alberta Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Sciences, where he oversaw the administration of grants totaling over $10M. Dr. Smith received an MSc in Veterinary Microbiology, a PhD in Viral Immunopathology from the University of Saskatchewan, and he completed his post­doctoral fellowship in the Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Alberta. Dr. Smith has over 15 years of experience in industry, having worked with several Biotech Companies in Alberta, including ChemBioMed, Alberta Reseach Council, AltaRex and VirRexx. In 2003, Dr. Smith joined the University of Alberta as Co­ordinator, Research Development & Industry Relations for the Department of Agricultural, Food and Nutritional Science (AFNS) where he assisted academics with research development and program funding.

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Kenneth R. Code

Chief Science Office Emeritus

Ken is the inventor of the AOS water treatment system. He holds 16 issued patents on iodine-related processes and technologies, and is a majority shareholder of BioLargo Inc. Ken earned his BSc double major in Chemistry and Mathematics from the University of Calgary in 1967. From 1976, he worked in the oilfield chemicals market, and rose to the VP position with Continental Emsco (later LTV Energy) which he held from 1979-1989. Mr. Code has significant industrial experience from ten years of project management at LTV Energy Products and DRECO Energy Services, where he helped construct the Shell Draugen oil rig in Norway from 1990-1991. In 1995, he commenced work on developing what would become BioLargo’s technologies.

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Laura Patterson-Fortin, PhD

Chief Science Officer and Lead Research Scientist

Laura received a PhD in Microbiology and Biotechnology from the University of Alberta and completed her postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Florida. Laura has over 10 years’ experience in the fields of molecular biology and microbiology using innovative techniques to study bacterial responses to their environment. She also has extensive biotechnology product development experience. Laura now leads BioLargo Water’s research and development of the disinfection capabilities of the AOS, and has been responsible for countless projects that resulted in improvements to the AOS and/or and expanded understanding of how it works.

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Jenny Boutros

Product Development Team Lead

Jenny Boutros is an Engineering Research Scientist at BioLargo Water and joined the company in 2016. Jenny plays a key role in the design and development of the Advanced Oxidation System (AOS) through prototype design and development, testing, scale-up, as well as supervising a team of very talented young scientists. She holds an MSc. in Chemical and Materials Engineering from the University of Alberta with a focus on Thermodynamic Modelling, and a BSc. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Balamand. She also has experience in techno-economic modelling, grant writing, as well as 3D modelling and fabrication. Jenny also served as a managing member of the Lebanese Red Cross – Koura Division for 2 years and is an accomplished musician and composer.

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Gavin Kim

Research Scientist

Prior to joining Biolargo Water, Gavin was with Alter NRG as a junior process engineer for 3 years in the Renewable Energy industry. Next, he spent next 4 years with AUSENCO as a process engineer in the Oil & Gas industry. He also worked for the Town of Cochrane as a water operator. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Western Ontario in 2008 and completed a Water and Wastewater Technician program at NAIT in 2018. At BioLargo Water, he is a research scientist tasked with optimizing the AOS' physical configuration and works on the poultry processing pilot project.

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Tonya Chandler

Director of Marketing and Strategic Development

Tonya Chandler is a seasoned water and wastewater market executive with more than 20 years experience, with a special focus on marketing and sales. Tonya is respected in the water industry for her talent in creating effective and eye-catching marketing campaigns and her ability to aid clients in finding out-of-the-box solutions to their challenges. She has expertise in branding and innovation, international business, trade show and event coordination, publication writing and content creation, social media and digital marketing, project management, sales performance, and more. Her B2B and B2C sales, marketing, and channel management experience serve a crucial role for BioLargo Water as it works to commercialize and deploy its clean water technology in the market place.

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Cassandra Jessome

Research Technologist

Cassie first joined Biolargo Water in 2016 where she completed a yearlong student internship studying greywater disinfection in the AOS. After finishing her Bachelor of Science specializing in animal biology with a focus on parasitology at the University of Alberta she returned as a laboratory technician in early 2018 where she utilizes her skills in bacterial, viral, and chemical analysis to further study the AOS and aids in the training and supervision of new hires and student interns. Cassie has been an integral part of the research and development activities of the AOS including work on the storm water pilot project, the poultry pilot project, and alternative material studies.

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Cassie Kotyk

Waste Water Engineering Technologist

Prior to joining the team at BioLargo Water, Cassie studied at NAIT for 2 years to receive her Instrumentation Engineering Technologies diploma. Shortly after, she received her 3rd class power engineering ticket. After completing her 4th class power engineering program and working towards her 3rd class ticket she worked as a water re-use operator at Imperial Oil in Cold Lake, Alberta. At BioLargo Water, she is working to help optimize the AOS system in the poultry processing pilot project.

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Carter Goertzen

Instrumentation & Engineering, Technologist

Carter was one of the first ten people hired at BioLargo Water. He is an expert at all things tech, from computers to 3D printers. Carter has become integral to daily operations at BioLargo Water. His proficiency with CAD and 3D printing allows the company to rapid prototype new designs, which is essential to developing and testing different versions of the AOS. In addition to computer / printing knowledge, Carter is very handy with all tools and technology available to the BioLargo team and can be counted on to fabricate almost anything.

BioLargo Engineering Team 

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Randall Moore

President, BioLargo Engineering

Randy’s experience includes over 30 years of industrial commercial engineering with senior roles in commercial consulting, air quality, project engineering, environmental permitting, testing and equipment design. Prior to joining BioLargo Engineering as President, his career history includes senior operational leadership roles at CB&I Environmental & Infrastructure and CB&I’s Integrated Environmental Solutions – a consulting and engineering group within CB&I. While leading IES Group, he worked to identify, develop and commercialize emerging technologies and apply those technologies to recalcitrant environmental issues in the industrial sector. In this role he directed fundamental research that resulted in five U.S. Patents and one Chinese Patent. As Business Line  Manager, Commercial Consulting and Engineering at ShawEnvironmental & Infrastructure, he was responsible for profit and loss, operations and business development of all commercial projects for the 175 person Knoxville office.

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Kevin Jackson

VP, Technical Director, BioLargo Engineering

With over 30 years as a Chemical Engineer, Kevin leads BioLargo’s efforts in waste water treatment and facility design, storm water permitting and control planning, process engineering design and control, NEPDES permitting, and RCRA/TSCA compliance and permitting.

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Russell Bryson

VP, Principal Engineer, BioLargo Engineering

Russell is a Registered Professional Engineer (PE) in Mechanical Engineering in Tennessee and registered Project Management Professional (PMP) with more than 29 years of experience in engineering consulting, design and process evaluation, logistics, quality assurance, project/program management, business development, facilities and operations management, and field project management. His practical knowledge and experiences have been developed across commercial and governmental projects including air permitting, thermal incineration, electric utility power generation, nuclear power generation, and numerous commercial production operations.

As Vice President-Principal Engineer for BioLargo Engineering, he brings these decades of practical experience to provide tactical project and business decisions for the execution of projects in order to maintain schedules, budgets and deliverables to clients and to ensure sound decision making on new project and business opportunities.

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Dan Jarvis

Director of Operations, BioLargo Engineering

Dan’s experience includes 35 years of work in environmental soil and water investigation and remediation, wastewater treatment plant operations, stormwater and spill prevention control and countermeasure plans. He is a Certified Radiation worker, specializing in Phase 1 and 2 environmental investigations.  Dan’s expertise also includes work as a certified hazardous waste shipper, health and safety officer, procurement and project management.

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Sam Liao

Lead Chemist, BioLargo Engineering

Sam has 12 years of environmental consulting experience, serving as a project scientist with clients from chemical, petroleum, wood mill, paper mill, steel mill, utility and the renewable energy industry. Additionally, he is sophisticated in operating GC, HPLC, IC, CEC, AAs, TGA, XRD and SEM. Sam edited final reports in several projects involved with US-EPA ICR program. He holds an MS in Chemistry from ChungYuan Christian University in Taiwan focusing on chemical and material analysis.

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Dr. Shan Yong

Business Development Advisor

Shan has more than 14 years of experience in international business development and technology consulting in the water and environmental sector, featuring work with companies that include Veolia Water Technologies North America, SembCorp Industries Singapore, SafBon Shanghai Water Holding, Nanostone, and Aquafortus.  Her experience includes new technology commercialization, technology assessment, feasibility studies, marketing, strategic planning, sustainability studies, M&A and partnership development. Shan is also an established author with more than 370 citations on her high impact research papers in the field of Environmental Engineering. Shan graduated with honors with her Bachelors of Science in Civil and Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign and obtained her Masters in Civil and Environmental Engineering from MIT. Following that, she completed her doctorate in Chemical Environmental Engineering from Yale University specializing in Forward Osmosis and is considered an expert in Osmotically Driven Membrane Processes. She is a Project Management Professional.

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