Umesh Gangadharmath, Ph.D. is Chief Technical Officer with more than 19 years of experience in radiopharmaceutical development and GMP manufacturing across academic and commercial settings. His expertise spans oncology, cardiology, and neurology, with a focus on PET imaging agents and radioligand therapies.

Dr. Gangadharmath has led radiopharmaceutical programs from preclinical development and IND-enabling CMC through early clinical research and full clinical production and has established GMP manufacturing facilities globally to support clinical trials. He was a founding member of Optimal Tracers, a radiopharmaceutical CDMO, where he spent a decade building the organization from concept to a fully operational GMP facility, later acquired by Telix Pharmaceuticals. His team also contributed to the establishment of a GMP radiopharmaceutical manufacturing facility at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center.

Previously, Dr. Gangadharmath served as Director of the biomedical cyclotron facility at UCLA and as a Senior Scientist in Radiochemistry at Siemens Molecular Imaging Biomarker Research, where he was part of the team that developed TAUVID® (flortaucipir). He has served on the USP Radioactive Drugs Expert Panel and established a molecular imaging division at Loma Linda University Medical Center.

Dr. Gangadharmath holds an M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry from Karnatak University, India, and completed postdoctoral training at the University of California, Los Angeles.