Sean Caffrey is the Executive Director of the Acceleration Consortium, a global research initiative led by the University of Toronto (UofT) that is transforming scientific discovery. The Acceleration Consortium joins materials science with artificial intelligence, robotics and advanced computing to build self-driving labs that can discover new materials 100 times faster. Rapid materials discovery is critical to addressing society’s global challenges. Sean helped to launch the Acceleration Consortium while working at the office of the Vice-President of Research and Innovation as the Executive Director, Strategic Initiatives Development. In this role, Sean led a team developing and scaling high-priority interdisciplinary research networks and supporting these networks through fundraising and partnership development with industry, public sector research institutes, and not-for-profit agencies. Before joining the UofT, Sean worked in several capacities at Genome Alberta.

Sean received an MBA specializing in entrepreneurship and innovation, a Ph.D. in Microbial Genomics, and a Project Management Professional certification. In addition to his interest in research, Sean is a professional photographer, and his travel photography has appeared in major publications such as National Geographic.