Maria Andrea Azcarate-Peril, Ph.D., is a Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of CogniBiome Therapeutics, Inc. She is a Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine and Director of the Microbiome Core at the Center for Gastrointestinal Biology and Disease. She earned her Ph.D. in Microbiology from the Reference Center for Lactobacilli (CERELA) in Argentina and has spent over two decades studying the gut microbiome, with a focus on prebiotics, aging, and cognitive function. Her research, spanning 136 peer-reviewed publications, includes clinical trials linking gut microbiota composition to cognitive performance in older adults, work that directly informs CogniBiome's mission to prevent cognitive decline through the microbiome.