Salerno - Leadership

Reynolds (Ren) M. Salerno, PhD

Director

Division of Laboratory Systems (DLS)

Center for Surveillance, Epidemiology, and Laboratory Services

Office of Public Health Scientific Services

Dr. Salerno, who became Director of the Division of Laboratory Systems in January 2016, has an international reputation for excellence in promoting the safe, secure, and responsible handling of dangerous biological agents in laboratory settings. His previous position as Senior Manager for Biological Sciences and Technologies at Sandia National Laboratories included work with laboratory quality systems, biosafety, biosecurity, biocontainment, and infectious disease diagnostics.

Dr. Salerno has advanced biorisk management in hundreds of bioscience laboratories in more than 50 countries. He is a United States delegate to Technical Committee 212 of the International Organization for Standardization, and has served on the Board of Directors of the International Federation of Biosafety Associations (and was previously its Vice Chairman). He has been a technical advisor to both the World Health Organization and the U.S. Defense Science Board’s Task Force on Deterring, Preventing, and Responding to the Threat or Use of Weapons of Mass Destruction.

Dr. Salerno has served as a member of the U.S. delegation to the Biological Weapons Convention, the “Dual-Use Biological Research Guidelines” working group of the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, and the International Criminal and Police Organization’s Counter-Bioterrorism Board of Experts. He has been recognized as a Next Generation Fellow on “U.S. Global Policy and the Future of International Institutions” by the American Assembly at Columbia University.

Dr. Salerno is the co-author of Laboratory Biosecurity Handbook (CRC Press, 2007) and Laboratory Biorisk Management: Biosafety and Biosecurity (CRC Press, 2015). Dr. Salerno is a member of the American Society for Microbiology, the American Biological Safety Association, and the Association for Public Health Laboratories. He currently serves on APHL’s Biosafety and Biosecurity Committee. He received bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College, and his PhD from Yale University.