Maria Freire (scientist)

For the artist, see María Freire (artist)

Maria C. Freire, Ph.D., is President of The Foundation for the National Institutes of Health.

Dr. Maria C. Freire was appointed President and Executive Director of the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH) in November 2012. Chartered by Congress in 1990, the FNIH forges public-private partnerships and alliances to advance breakthrough biomedical discoveries that can change and improve the quality of people’s lives, drawing together the world’s foremost researchers and resources in support of the mission of the NIH. Prior to this appointment, Dr. Freire was the President of the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation, where she established novel programmatic initiatives that expanded the brand and reach of the foundation. From 2001 to 2008, she was the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Global Alliance for TB Drug Development (TB Alliance), a not-for-profit organization that develops drugs to fight tuberculosis. During her tenure, Dr. Freire took the organization from a nascent operation to a world leader in TB drug development.

Dr. Freire directed the Office of Technology Transfer at the National Institutes of Health from 1995 to 2001, where she oversaw the transfer of federally-funded technology from the not-for-profit sector to the for-profit sector and ensured continuing availability of technology as to not limit basic research or encumber future products for public benefit. Prior to that, Dr. Freire established and headed the Office of Technology Development at the University of Maryland, Baltimore and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

Dr. Freire is active on national and international boards and committees. She was a member of the Science Board of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and served as Chair from (2013-2015); is the Chair of the Business Advisory Board of the Institute for Biomedical Research, Barcelona, Spain; has served as a member of the Commission on the Global Health Risk Framework for the Future of the National Academy of Medicine and the Executive Committee of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Solutions Network. Dr. Freire also served as a member of the UN Secretary General High Level Panel on Access to Medicines, which issued a report on promoting innovation and access to health technologies. She also was selected as one of ten Commissioners of the World Health Organization’s Commission on Intellectual Property Rights, Innovation and Public Health (CIPIH) and served as a member on the International Advisory Committee for the Carlos Slim Health Institute. She also served as a member of the GAVI Alliance Board from 2012-2015 and as an unaffiliated member as well as a member of the Advisory Committee to the Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) from 2008-2012.

Dr. Freire was elected to the Council on Foreign Relations in 2009.

In 2008, Dr. Freire was elected to the Institute of Medicine (National Academy of Medicine).

A native of Lima, Peru, Dr. Freire trained at the Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia. She received a Ph.D. in Biophysics from the University of Virginia and completed post-graduate work in immunology and virology at the University of Virginia and at the University of Tennessee, respectively, and at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. She is the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship as well as two AAAS Congressional Science Fellowships, sponsored by the Biophysical Society and the American Society for Photobiology.