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VOL.37, NO.12
The accidental entrepreneurs
I N S I D E …
LEISURE & TRAVEL
A thrilling trip through the Panama Canal isn’t the only highlight of the country page 26
Jasmin El Kordi, left, and Dr. Kan Cao, right, are the CEO and chief scientific officer of Mblue Labs, which formulates a line of 11 anti-aging Bluelene products. Last year the U.S. Department of Commerce named the University of Maryland portfolio company one of America’s top 100 small businesses.
Scientific background
Cao, who grew up in China, received her undergraduate degree in biology in Nanjing. She moved to Maryland to attend graduate school at Johns Hopkins. With a Ph.D. in biology, Cao began her postdoc in genomics at the National Institutes of Health in 2005. That’s when Francis
Collins, longtime director of NIH, tapped her to start researching progeria. In his lab, Cao’s experiments were “exquisitely designed and beautifully conducted,” Collins told the University of Maryland. Cao became one of the country’s leading See ANTI-AGING, page 17
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ARTS & STYLE
Ford’s Theatre puts a new spin on A Christmas Carol; plus, a physician’s memoir; winter nonfiction; and Bob Levey on kids’ sports page 29
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PHOTO COURTESY OF MBLUE LABS
By Margaret Foster As John Lennon once sang, “Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans.” Scientist and college professor Dr. Kan Cao had spent most of her career studying a rare disease, progeria, which causes premature aging in children. Eleven years ago, in her research lab at the University of Maryland, Cao noticed something unusual: Cells with misshapen, diseased nuclei suddenly looked plump and healthy when accidentally exposed to a common lab stain called methylene blue. “That happens in scientific research a lot,” Cao said in an interview with the Beacon. “We want to research A, have a hypothesis, but in the end, we discover B.” First, she published her findings on progeria. Then she did what most scientists do: asked another lab to repeat the experiment. The other lab “actually observed the same thing,” Cao recalled. “Then I became more serious” about methylene blue, both to extend the lives of those with progeria and to preserve the skin cells of people as they age normally. When Cao told the university about her findings, they were as excited as she was. Its Ventures program, which helps the school’s faculty and students commercialize their research breakthroughs, paired her with an alum, Maryland entrepreneur Jasmin El Kordi, as her CEO. Today their company, Mblue Labs, has almost a dozen products in its Bluelene skincare line. Now in their seventh year, they opened their own warehouse and logistics office in Beltsville, Maryland, in September. “We’re not a beauty company,” said El Kordi. “We’re a scientific company that made an incredible discovery that reverses human aging.”
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