BioMed Central's in-house team

BioMed Central

Matthew Cockerill, Managing Director

Matt has overall responsibility for all aspects of BioMed Central's activities. He has been involved with BioMed Central since its launch in 1999, serving first as Technical Director and later as Director of Operations. Prior to BioMed Central, he played a major role in the creation of BioMedNet, a pioneering web site for biologists which incorporated the Trends and the Current Opinion review journals. He has a PhD in Biochemistry, which he obtained working under the guidance of Tim Hunt at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund. He also has a long-standing interest in the use of technology to structure and manage biological and medical knowledge.

Bryan Vickery, Chief Operating Officer

Bryan is responsible for Operations, including author services, all aspects of the production of articles once they are accepted for publication, special projects such as journal supplements as well as project management. Bryan has a background in Chemistry, and in the late 1990s worked at Current Science Group (what is now Science Navigation Group) on the ChemWeb.com portal (sister to BioMed Net), which he went on to run after it was acquired by Elsevier. He also has experience in running preprint servers and A&I databases, and was MD at Elsevier Advanced Technology (EAT) publishing a range of magazines, newsletters, company profiles and conferences

Deborah Kahn, Publishing Director

Deborah is responsible for leading the publishing teams to provide an excellent experience for our authors, editors and referees, and for ensuring that BioMed Central continues to grow its portfolio of open access journals. Deborah's career has spanned STM journal and book publishing, database publishing, and research and consultancy. She has been a supporter of open access since the beginning. A mathematician by training, she also has a Masters degree in Organisational Behaviour and a Diploma in Integrative Psychotherapy.

Ed Darnell, IT Strategy Director

Responsible for all aspects of Information Technology, Ed joined the BioMed Central team in March 2009, having formerly worked with Matt and many of the team in the pioneering days of BioMedNet & ChemWeb. With a background in Pure Mathematics and Computer Science, and a passion for business agility, Ed has had the good fortune to lead many talented teams. Prior to joining BioMed Central Ed headed up technology for CMPi, the largest operating division of United Business Media plc. Outside work Ed is a keen if mediocre triathlete and devoted dad.

Editorial

Melissa Norton, Editorial Director (Medicine)

Melissa has overall editorial responsibility for BioMed Central's medical publishing activity, including the acquisition and development of new medical journal titles. She is responsible for editorial oversight of the BMC series, as the series Editor-in-Chief. Melissa has a degree in genetics, developmental and cell biology from Dartmouth College and earned her MD from Washington University School of Medicine. After completion of the residency program at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, she spent several years in clinical practice as a hospitalist in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. She is a Diplomate of the American Board of Internal Medicine. Melissa joined BioMed Central in 2005 as Medical Editor, and assumed responsibility for the BMC series in 2007.

Michaela Torkar, Editorial Director (Biology)

Michaela has overall editorial responsibility for BioMed Central's biological publishing activity, including the in-house editorial management of a group of biological journals publishing broad-interest research articles and commissioned review content, including Genome Biology (of which she is Editor), BMC Biology and Journal of Biology. She also oversees the acquisition of new biological journals, and the development and improvement of those titles. Michaela has a degree in biology from Munich University and a PhD in Immunology from Cambridge University. She joined BioMed Central in 2000 (soon after its launch) as a member of the Genome Biology team.

Technology

Martin Gladdish, Head of Development

Martin runs BioMed Central's team of web developers, responsible for the technology platform that drives BioMed Central's journals and websites.

Tom Mowlam, Production Director

Tom runs BioMed Central's production team, which is responsible for processing manuscripts from acceptance to final publication.