Some leaders are attracted to titles. While other people are attracted to problems of significance. In the case of Nazli Azimi, the concept of moving into the field of biotechnology leadership started with the passion to put science into practice, something that can make a difference in life. Having been trained as a PharmD/PhD and influenced in her initial research at the NIH, she soon learned that making a discovery is not sufficient. Innovations can only be relevant when delivered to patients.
Nazli is at the forefront of next-generation RNA medicine and works as a Co-founder and CEO of Therna Biosciences. It is not all about technology in her story. It is of resiliency and first-principles thought, the audacity to be concerned with what matters to us well before it becomes self-evident.
The Moment That Sparked Therna
Therna did not begin as a business plan. It began with a conversation.
Nazli’s “aha” moment came through a chance encounter with scientific co-founder Hani Goodarzi, one of the early pioneers of RNA regulation and AI-driven RNA design. During her own research years, Nazli had already recognized RNA’s enormous therapeutic potential, but also its limitations. Traditional approaches struggled with imprecise design, delivery challenges, and safety trade-offs.
When Hani shared his vision of merging RNA decoding with artificial intelligence, Nazli immediately understood what was possible. She saw a future where RNA could become a programmable medicine, designed intentionally, precisely, and safely at scale.
That insight led to the founding of Therna: a platform-driven company built to change how RNA therapeutics are created. Alongside Hani, respected scientists including Timo Hagen and Kian Yousefi joined the founding team, helping shape Therna’s scientific backbone.
“From the start, my mission was clear to use AI to design RNA medicines that are not only more effective, but fundamentally safer, across many diseases,” she shares.
Teaching AI to Design Biology
While mRNA became widely known during the pandemic, Nazli knew that vaccines were only the beginning of RNA’s story. At Therna, the team reached a turning point when they began generating massive, high-quality RNA datasets across diverse cellular contexts. These experiments revealed conserved principles of how RNA behaves inside living systems.
That was when Nazli realized something profound.
They were no longer just studying biology. They were building the foundation to teach AI how to design it.
By uniting large-scale experimentation with AI-driven learning, RNA design shifted from slow trial-and-error to a predictive, intentional process. The ambition quickly expanded, to build a platform capable of creating long-lasting, tissue-specific RNAs without relying on circular RNA.
“For me, this was not incremental innovation. It was a fundamental shift in how medicine could be built,” Nazli says.
From Lab Precision to Leadership Ambiguity
Moving from scientist to CEO came with a steep learning curve. In the lab, progress depends on reducing uncertainty. In a biotech startup, progress often requires making high-stakes decisions with incomplete information.
Nazli had to learn that precision in leadership looks very different from precision in experiments.
She became comfortable operating in ambiguity, setting direction, aligning people, and committing resources before the data was ever perfect. What helped was realizing that her scientific mindset was not a limitation. It was an advantage.
The rigor, skepticism, and first-principles thinking she developed as a researcher now guide how she evaluates risk, builds strategy, and leads teams. Her focus shifted from optimizing experiments to building systems, culture, and momentum, so breakthrough science could become real medicine.
Bridging the past and present: IL-15 to RNA medicines
Much of Nazli’s earlier work focused on immune regulation, especially around cytokine pathways and the role of IL-15 as a central regulator of inflammation. In that context, Nazli and her team had shown that by targeting and blocking selective cytokines anchored around IL-15, immune system can be recalibrated to a normal state. This precision targeting is in contrast to shotgun approach of blocking the entire immune system to control autoimmune or inflammatory diseases.
Nazli is now applying the same idea of targeted therapy with RNA medicines at Therna Biosciences. RNA medicines are exquisitely selective in targeting and fixing the broken pathways in many diseases which result in safer and more effective medicines.
Redefining What It Means to Be Visionary
Nazli does not believe that visionary leadership is about predicting trends. To her, it is about conviction. It is about choosing to work on something important before it is obvious. In biotech, novel therapies almost always look risky at first. There is rarely a clear playbook.
“Vision means staying grounded in first principles, learning as data evolves, and continuing forward even when outcomes are uncertain. It is follow-through, not foresight, that defines true innovation,” she says.
Playing it safe rarely leads to breakthroughs. Progress comes from persistence.
Finding Partners Who Believe in the Long Game
Raising capital for unproven biological platforms is never easy. Nazli approaches investors the same way she approaches science, with transparency and integrity. She looks for partners who value long-term impact over quick wins, who understand that transformative medicine requires patience and trust.
She is open about risks and complexities, while clearly articulating how Therna’s platform can unlock entirely new classes of therapies. Over time, she has built relationships with investors who share her commitment to scientific rigor and patient outcomes.
“Alignment on values matters as much as alignment on vision,” Nazli shares.
Building a Culture Where Curiosity Thrives
At Therna, breakthrough science requires both boldness and discipline. Nazli sets ambitious benchmarks and holds her teams to high standards. But she also works hard to create psychological safety, an environment where scientists feel empowered to take calculated risks and fail fast when needed.
Each iteration brings learning. Each experiment moves the mission forward.
By combining clear expectations with trust and transparency, she has built a culture where curiosity thrives and innovation becomes possible.
Keeping Patients at the Center
Behind every dataset is a person waiting for relief.
Nazli keeps patients at the heart of every decision from which programs Therna prioritizes, to how studies are designed, to how safety and efficacy are evaluated. She encourages her team to hear patient stories firsthand, reminding everyone why the work matters.
“For me, the patient is the true north. This perspective brings urgency, focus, and humanity to the long R&D journey,” she says.
Partnering Without Losing Independence
As the line between Big Pharma and agile biotech continues to blur, Nazli is thoughtful about collaboration.
Therna partners with global organizations when it strengthens their mission, whether through manufacturing scale, regulatory expertise, or worldwide reach. But every partnership must respect Therna’s platform-driven approach and culture of experimentation.
“Clear alignment on values comes first. By staying disciplined about collaboration, we ensure Therna retains its agility and bold scientific spirit,” Nazli says.
Building From First Principles
Nazli approaches every challenge by going back to fundamentals. Rather than relying on industry habits or inherited frameworks, she starts with simple questions: What is the real biological problem? Why has it not been solved yet? And what would the ideal solution look like if nothing were off limits?
This first-principles mindset shapes how Therna builds its platform. Instead of optimizing around existing RNA limitations, Nazli and her team reimagined how RNA medicines could be designed from the ground up, using data, experimentation, and AI to uncover rules that biology itself follows.
Operating this way requires comfort with uncertainty. Many decisions must be made before outcomes are fully known. Nazli has learned to move forward with conviction while staying flexible, allowing new data to continuously refine direction.
She believes this balance, between commitment and adaptability, is what allows truly transformative science to emerge. Progress does not come from waiting for perfect clarity. It comes from taking thoughtful steps, learning quickly, and staying anchored to purpose.
“Leadership in biotech means building systems that can evolve, scale, and respond, so breakthrough ideas don’t remain in laboratories, but move steadily toward real impact for patients,” Nazli shares.
Working With Regulators as Allies
For novel RNA platforms, regulatory pathways are often built in real time. Nazli views regulators, including the Food and Drug Administration, as partners rather than obstacles. She believes in engaging early, sharing data openly, and collaborating to define standards that protect patients while enabling innovation.
Her goal is simple and about the same she says, “ Accelerate breakthrough science responsibly, so transformative therapies reach people without unnecessary delay.”
Beyond RNA: A New View of Longevity
Looking ahead, Nazli sees AI-driven multi-modal biology as a major force shaping human longevity.
By combining genomics, proteomics, and cellular phenotyping at scale, researchers can begin to understand aging as a network of interconnected pathways. This convergence of high-dimensional biology with predictive AI could shift longevity research from observation to precise intervention.
For Nazli, this represents another step toward a future where medicine becomes more proactive, personalized, and preventative.
The Legacy She Hopes to Leave
Nazli began her journey as a post-doctoral fellow at the NIH and went on to help build multiple biotech companies. What continues to motivate her is the process of turning cutting-edge science into real-world impact.
When she looks toward the future, she hopes her contribution will be measured in lives transformed, in organizations built with rigor and heart, and in platforms that turn previously untreatable diseases into treatable ones.
She wants to be remembered for expanding what is possible in medicine, and for building lasting infrastructure that helps breakthrough science reach patients faster and more safely.
For Nazli Azimi, leadership is not about certainty. It is about courage. Courage to pursue first-in-class ideas. Courage to lead in ambiguity. And courage to believe that with the right science, the right people, and the right values, medicine can be redesigned for generations to come.
