Dr. Dennis K. McBride
Chief Strategy Officer and Senior Scientist,
NRx Pharmaceuticals
Dr. Dennis K. McBride is Chief Strategy Officer and Senior Scientist at NRx Pharmaceutical, an R&D firm dedicated to the development of small molecule drugs for life-threatening diseases. He was appointed affiliated professor of Microbiology and Immunology, Georgetown Medical Center in 2003, and also serves as Adjunct Professor, Virginia Tech Hume Center for National Security and Technology, Professor of Practice, School of Public and International Affairs at Virginia Tech. He is President (volunteer) of the Institute for Regulatory Science. Dennis retired from, and is President Emeritus, Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, a nonprofit, non-partisan think tank that provides scientific and policy advice to Congress, the White House and the Judiciary. Dr. McBride has authored and co-authored major invited and commissioned technical works, including amici curiae for the United States Supreme Court.
Dennis served a 20--year career as an engineering/medical and psychological scientist with the Medical Department of the U.S. Navy, with tours at six national level, advanced technology laboratories, including leadership of Joint Services Biomedical Science and Technology Programs. Dennis’ formal Service training included Naval Aerospace Experimental Psychologist/Physiologist at the Naval Aerospace Medical Institute, and Flight Test Engineering, U.S. Navy Test Pilot School/University of Tennessee Space Institute. Captain McBride served two tours at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) as program manager for more than $100M in high tech development. Three of the technologies that Dr. McBride developed now account for more than $30B per year in total revenue world-wide. Dennis retired as Captain (O-6), Medical Service Corps in 2000.
Post Navy retirement, Dr. McBride served in a Senior Executive position as Director and Distinguished Scholar, Center for Technology and National Security Policy, National Defense University; as Executive Director, Institute for Simulation and Training (UCF) and A Vice President for Research, George Mason University. Dr. McBride was elected by faculty to full professor in colleges of engineering and of arts & sciences in 1999. He also serves in colleges of medicine and public policy, developing and teaching some dozen graduate courses and has supervised more than 50 Master’s and Ph.D. student projects. Dr. McBride has built or co-developed several small for-profit businesses (e.g., MasterLink; Quantum Leap), serves on multiple Boards (e.g., Object Video), and has led or participated in numerous National Academies and professional society study projects. He has authored or co-authored more than 150 technical and scientific publications, and served twice as an academic journal editor-in-chief (Technology; and Review of Policy Research).
Among Dr. McBride’s awards for scientific contribution are the Legion of Merit, Defense Superior Service Medal, and the Joint Service Meritorious Service Medal. Having majored in chemistry, Dennis holds the Ph.D., and M.S. in experimental psychology (the University of Georgia); M.S.P.A./MPA in public administration; M.S. in Systems from the Viterbi School of Engineering, University of Southern California; and post-doctoral studies at the London School of Economics. He is a recent graduate of the Advanced Biostatistics Program at the Institute of Statistics Education, Arlington Virginia.