Dr. C. Taylor Gilliland is the Senior Advisor for Innovation Programs within the Office of the Director at NIBIB and supports the Institute in designing and implementing innovation initiatives across scientific and operational domains. In this role, Dr. Gilliland also serves as NIBIB’s Challenge Manager and assists staff in the development and management of prize competitions, an open innovation mechanism. Taylor first joined NIBIB on detail in April 2020 as the policy, communications, and reporting team lead for the Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics Technology (RADx-Tech) Program and began his current position in June 2021. Previously, Dr. Gilliland was the Senior Policy Advisor to the NIH Deputy Director for Program Coordination, Planning, and Strategic Initiatives within the Office of the Director providing expert scientific, programmatic, and policy analysis and advice across a range of biomedical research initiatives and serving as NIH’s lead Challenge Manager. He first came to NIH as an AAAS Science & Technology Policy Fellow in the Office of Policy, Communications, and Education at the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences where he was instrumental in developing the Center’s inaugural strategic plan and co-led the NIH Translational Science Training Program. Taylor received his Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences from the University of California San Diego where he studied structure-function relationships among the chemokine family of G-protein coupled receptors, and a B.S. in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology from the University of Florida.