Joshua A. Rackers

Hello! I am a scientist interested in answering questions and discovering emergent phenomena at the intersection of physics, chemistry and molecular biology. I build tools that use physics and AI to understand the molecular world. These tools are advancing the frontiers of drug discovery and biomedicine.

I started my career as a high school physics and chemistry teacher in Baltimore, Maryland with Teach For America. Teaching young people shaped how I see the role of science in the world. After teaching, I completed a Ph.D. in biophysics from Washington University in St. Louis, and then became a Truman Fellow at Sandia National Labs. After my fellowship, I worked for two years as a scientist and group leader at Prescient Design, the AI research division of Genentech. I am now one of the founding members of Achira, a startup building foundation models for chemistry to transform drug discovery.