Institute of Biotechnology Liaison

Tami Magnus

Tami Magnus has lived and worked in New York State’s Southern Tier and Central regions for most of her career. Her career encompasses government, not-for-profit and higher education fields, with experience in health care services, workforce and economic development, and administration.

Tami was employed for over ten years by Tioga County in rural upstate New York, serving as a case manager for community health services and Director of Employment and Training. She also served as the Director of Volunteer Services, and eventually Director of Finance, for Southern Tier AIDS Program (STAP).

Beginning her Cornell career as a financial analyst in the University Budget Office following completion of her Master’s in Business Administration at Binghamton University, Tami and her family moved to the Ithaca area. In 2015, Tami accepted the position of Executive Director for the Institute of Biotechnology. This role encompasses her interests in health and life sciences, administration, and New York State business development and growth.

Kurt Deriziotis

Pursuing a career at the interface of science and business, Kurt received dual Executive MBA degrees from the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business and the Smith School of Business at Queen’s University. Kurt joined the Cornell Institute of Biotechnology in 2023 as the CAT Business Outreach Director. With a 19-year career in laboratory diagnostics, he has been dedicated to tackling infectious disease across human, veterinary, and environmental health. During the pandemic, he pursued remote management consulting opportunities through The Solution Lab, a boutique NYC life science consulting firm. In that challenging and evolving landscape, Kurt worked with multiple early- and mid-stage startups over the last 2 years, guiding projects in antimicrobial drug discovery or those venturing in diagnostic innovations covering infectious disease and oncology. Kurt was previously at the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Animal Health Diagnostic Center, where he was a diagnostic technologist in Bacteriology since joining Cornell in 2013.