Ann Lesperance, Director
Regional Programs
Northwest Regional Technology Center for Homeland Security
Phone: (206) 528-3223
Email: Ann.lesperance@pnnl.gov
Ann Lesperance has been with the PNNL since 1990. In her current capacity she is the director of the NWRTC located in Seattle, Washington. Her primary focus is developing regional programs to accelerate the demonstration and deployment of new Homeland Security technologies. To accomplish this, Lesperance works with state and local emergency responders and public safety officials to understand and help prioritize their operational needs and requirements. She also builds regional coalitions of emergency management professionals to partner with DHS S&T, the Department of Defense, federal agencies, and manages program implementation in the field.
Lesperance has a joint appointment to Northeastern University-Seattle and leads efforts to build the master’s program in Security and Resilience Studies and Urban Informatics. She was also awarded a Faculty Affiliate appointment with Northeastern’s Global Resilience Institute. In this role, she partners with the institute to identify and participate in interdisciplinary proposal efforts for new research and education collaborations.
Lesperance has over 30 years of experience as a researcher and project manager in domestic and international fields, including environmental and public health analysis, and disaster management and recovery from natural and man-made events. She is a recognized leader in response, recovery, and resiliency issues. Most recently, she was invited to join the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) Committee on Applied Research Topics for Hazard Mitigation and Resilience. The committee identifies applied research topics, information, and expertise to inform the science of natural hazard mitigation and resilience and enables applications of science, data, and technology. She was also previously selected to serve on a NASEM Steering Committee exploring a "whole of government" approach to international chemical/biological/radiological/nuclear events and on the NASEM Resilient American Roundtable, overseeing the work of the Program on Risk, Resilience, and Extreme Events.
Additionally, Lesperance has played key leadership roles in engaging the energy and public safety sectors on issues related to cybersecurity and resiliency. She championed efforts to develop an open-source information-sharing platform to enhance response and recovery from cyberattacks and supported a first-of-a-kind effort in Washington State to develop a cyber-attack emergency response annex.
- Bachelor of Arts, University of Wisconsin, Environmental Science and Latin American Studies
- Master of Science, University of California Los Angeles, Public Health, School of Public Health, Environmental Science and Engineering Program
Dr. Rachel Bartholomew, Deputy Director
Science and Technology Advisor
Nuclear, Chemistry and Biology Division
Phone: (509) 371-6906
Email: Rachel.bartholomew@pnnl.gov
Dr. Rachel Bartholomew is a science and policy advisor and team lead in the Chemical and Biological Signatures Group at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. She has over two decades of experience applying molecular biology to address national security, policy, and nonproliferation challenges. She has served as principal investigator and project manager for a variety of sponsors, including Departments of Homeland Security, Energy, State, and Defense, engaging with a range of domestic and international stakeholders including first responders, law enforcement, customs and border personnel, policymakers, and scientific subject matter experts.
Topics of these efforts range from scientific engagements on WMD threats with international partners, assessment of the research for the future of emergency management, and development and testing biological agent characterization methods and testing of white powder samples and for the first responder community, to analysis and visualization of U.S. biodefense policy. She has publications in the synthetic biology supply chain, a tool for biodefense policy visualization, and the evaluation of current off-the-shelf biodetection kits.
In 2023, Bartholomew was named Deputy Director for the Northwest Regional Technology Center, a virtual resource operated by PNNL to support local and regional preparedness, resiliency, response, and recovery. Concurrently, she is the principal investigator on projects exploring first responder technology, emergency management, and emergency operations centers of the future. These efforts are leveraging her decades of experience building relationships and connecting with the first responder community to capture and translate their technical requirements into research and solutions.
She received her BA in biology from Case Western Reserve University and PhD in animal physiology from Cornell University, where she was a National Science Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellow. Her post-doctoral training was completed at the FBI Laboratory Counterterrorism and Forensic Science Research Unit.
- PhD, Animal Physiology, Cornell University
- Bachelor of Arts, Biology, Case Western Reserve University