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Leaders & Innovators: Greg Cavey

Greg Cavey is founder and lab manager at Launch MI Lab in Kalamazoo. Launch MI Lab is a laboratory for life science startups, located at the Southwest Michigan Innovation Center. It has more than 2,300 square feet of secure wet lab space and access to equipment, including mass spectrometry systems, centrifuges, autoclaves, flow cytometers, a variety of microscopes, incubator, lyophilizer, upright freezer, and standard lab supplies and tools. Under his leadership, the lab has helped companies such as Metabolic Solutions Development Co., which earlier this year published data on a new drug target it has identified for improving the treatment of type 2 diabetes. The company contracted with Launch MI Lab to help define the proteins involved and their mechanism of action. Cavey, a biochemist and experienced research investigator, founded Launch MI Lab after more than 20 years in proteomics, mass spectrometry, and lab management. Previously, he was a research investigator at the Van Andel Research Institute in Grand Rapids, where he established and directed the Laboratory of Mass Spectrometry and Proteomics for eight years. Earlier, he was a group leader in the Upjohn Co.'s Control Biotechnology Unit where he supervised a protein chemistry lab. Following Upjohn's merger with Pharmacia, Cavey moved to human health discovery research where he established a proteomics operation that provided mass spectrometry support for biologists and protein chemists. Cavey currently provides mass spectrometry services and counsel for Southwest Michigan Innovation Center clients as well as for local, regional, and national research companies, universities, and colleges. He was named to the Association of Biomedical Resource Facilities Protein Sequencing Group to evaluate the use of mass spectrometry to determine the amino terminal sequence of proteins due to the growing popularity of mass spectrometry in biology and chemistry labs globally. Cavey received his bachelor's degree in biochemistry from Michigan State University. Read the full profile at www.ltu.edu/leaders.

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