Our Founding Scientists

Dr. Elmar J. Prenner Ph. D.

Dr. Elmar Prenner received his PhD at the University of Technology in Graz Austria in 1994. Subsequently he was postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Biophysics of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Biophysical Chemistry of the Max-Planck-Society in Göttingen, Germany.

In 1995 he was cofounder and CEO of a biomedical oriented start-up company to develop small devices and bioassays before he moved to Canada supported by fellowships from the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research and later on the Protein Engineering Network of Centers of Excellence to work on antimicrobial peptides in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Alberta.

In addition to consulting for several pharmaceutical companies, he was involved in collaborative research, consulting and product development with Nanofilm Technologie Inc, a world leader in surface analysis and surface imaging instruments.

Since 2002 he is a faculty member and Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research scholar in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Calgary. His research involves biomedically oriented based science and more applied orientated bioanalytical assays and device development. This technology is being commercialized through Health Screen Inc. where Dr. Prenner serves as Chief Scientific Officer.

Dr. Kirat Singh Ph. D.

Dr. Kirat Singh is currently the Director Research and Development at Health Screen Inc. where, under his direction, the company is commercializing breakthrough work for the detection of various pathogens and contaminants using portable devices.

In the past Dr Singh has worked on projects in the UK (University of Manchester) and Republic of Ireland (National Microelectronics Research Centre, Cork). As a Marie Curie Research Fellow at the NMRC, Dr Singh worked on computer simulation and design of microfluidic devices, fabrication of microstructures, development of optical waveguide sensors and design of an on-chip PCR chamber.

Closer to home, Dr Singh worked at the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering, University of Alberta, Canada, on the development of an optical instrument capable of characterising nano-scale intracellular structures.

With publications in international journals, along with several patents in this area, Dr Singh brings world-class expertise to this exciting and important venture.