Rose Pedretti is a scientist, entrepreneur, and advocate transforming how systemic amyloid diseases are diagnosed and treated. She leads the development of innovative clinical tools, translating deep molecular insights from her PhD and postdoctoral research into high-value diagnostics that can directly impact patient care. As co-founder of AmyGo Solutions and a postdoctoral researcher at UT Southwestern Medical Center, Rose bridges the worlds of academia and biotech, driving scientific innovation while building a company aimed at making under-recognized diseases more detectable and treatable. She is passionate about public engagement, mentorship, and elevating awareness for conditions historically labeled as “rare,” striving to empower clinicians, improve decision-making, and change outcomes for patients worldwide.
“Opportunities come when you take risks and put yourself in uncomfortable situations “– Rose Pedretti
Q1: For someone who doesn’t know what you do, how would you describe your work, and what motivated you to be here today?
I’m currently working on developing a blood test for a disease called cardiac amyloidosis. It’s an under-recognized cause of heart failure where proteins form plaques in the heart and eventually cause it to fail.
During my PhD, I worked on solving the molecular structures of these plaques and used that knowledge to design tools for either treatment or detecting disease. I discovered a novel blood biomarker in my thesis, and now I’m trying to bring that into the clinic by building a company around it. There’s currently no blood test for this disease; most patients need a heart biopsy just to get diagnosed.
There are treatments that work, but the problem is detecting the disease early, before patients develop severe heart failure. That’s what motivates me.
Q2: You’re currently both a postdoc and a co-founder. Did you plan this?
Not at all. This just kind of happened. A few months before I defended my PhD, my PI and I were presenting my data at conferences and faculty seminars, and we kept getting the same question: Have you thought about commercializing this? At the time, we didn’t think it was viable. But the excitement kept building.
I didn’t really know what it meant to start a company, but I decided to jump in because I didn’t have other plans. I assumed I’d do a traditional academic postdoc and figure things out later.
Q3: Your work spans science, biomarkers, public engagement, and business. What feels like your core identity?
As a co-founder of an early-stage biotech company, you have to do everything. You drive the science, engage with the public, think about business strategy, push contracts forward, otherwise the company doesn’t move.
At this stage, they’re all equally essential. Eventually I won’t be doing bench science anymore and will focus more on generating ideas and strategy.
I’m honestly most passionate about public engagement because this disease is so under-recognized, and I want people to know about it. But I’m spread across many roles, and I’ve had to learn skills I never had before, especially around business, intellectual property, and patenting.
Q4: How do you decide what to prioritize while balancing a postdoc and a startup?
I focus on the most immediate problems. Fundraising and grant applications are a major priority on the startup side, because without money, nothing happens.
On the lab side, I meet bi-weekly with my PI and we align priorities on current projects. I usually wait to see whether certain ideas arise more than once before acting. We’re typically very aligned, which helps us move efficiently.
I still do lab work and mentor grad students, but entrepreneurship gives me flexibility. I can schedule stakeholder calls and still show up in the lab when students need me. I try to limit myself to two or three major goals per week, but I constantly have to reevaluate my goals. Some days I definitely feel spread thin, it’s not perfect.
Q5: How has starting a company changed how you think about science?
When you’re doing research versus trying to bring a product to market, your mindset is completely different.
You have to think broadly: what experiments you run, how you validate them, what’s needed for FDA approval, and whether a test can realistically be used at any hospital. In academia, you’re focused on one experiment at a time. In biotech, you have to map out every step before you even start pipetting.
The first year of the company was honestly a struggle. Grant applications didn’t go well, but the feedback forced me to think differently. In startups and pharma, milestones are already defined, and you have to hit them, because that’s how funding continues. That pressure fundamentally changes how you approach science.
Q6: Are there benefits to staying connected to academia while building a company?
Yes. I still get to interact with academic colleagues who have more mental space to innovate. For me, I’m less focused on generating brand-new ideas and more focused on executing ideas.
Being in academia lets me stay creative, thinking about how to further innovate on our technology. That connection is very nice.
Q7: Was there anything that helped shape your transition into biotech?
A program called Nucleate was really critical for me. It’s a student-run nonprofit that teaches academic trainees what it takes to build a biotech startup, from de-risking technology to fundraising to team building.
That program really shifted my mindset from academia to biotech. I met incredible people and mentors that I still meet with. It’s global, free, and very accessible, and I found it to be really useful.
Q8: What mentorship do you think you were missing earlier in your journey?
I wish I had focused more on developing my soft skills during my PhD.
I didn’t know how to network, communicate my science in a way that was digestible, or talk to different types of people. The transition out of academia was much harder because of that. Opportunities come when you take risks and put yourself in uncomfortable situations, and I didn’t do that enough early on.
Those skills, communication, leadership, relationship-building, are honestly more important than technical skills.
Q9: Would you recommend the dual path of postdoc and startup?
I’m biased, but yes, if you have a strong network of mentors. There's so much more that goes into running a company than just the science. I probably think about science 5% of the time, and the other 95% is fundraising, negotiation, strategy, and communication.
You need people who can help you fill knowledge gaps and tolerate your questions. It’s stressful and a lot of work, but for me it feels worth it because I’m working toward directly impacting patients.
Q11: Why is public communication of science so important to you (Similar to our JoLS mission)?
If people don’t understand your science, they won’t care about it, and they won’t fund it.
Being able to explain your work clearly helps people connect with you and understand why you’re passionate. I’ve gone into meetings being overly technical, and people just disengage. It's really important to convey your science so that people can connect with you and they can also understand why you're so passionate about your science. Scientific communication is an art, and while I’m still learning, I think it’s essential, especially if you want to bring something into the real world.