MEET OUR TEAM


  • Co-Founder

    Michael is the proud father to Sebastián and Santiago. He has been a nonprofit leader for over twenty years, working to bring people together to protect our land and water for future generations, like Sebas and Santi.

    Michael loves being outdoors and shares that passion with Naomi and the boys every chance he gets: whether hiking or riding bikes along the irrigation ditches near their house, going camping and kayaking, teaching the boys how to fish, or simply playing ball in the front yard. He is an avid gardener and one of his favorite things is watching Sebas and Santi harvest and eat fresh tomatoes off the vine or fruit off the trees they planted together.

    Michael is committed to public service and has served on numerous volunteer boards. He is a W.K. Kellogg Foundation Community Leadership Network Fellow. He now realizes that his decades of advocacy experience has all been in preparation for this journey: to find a cure for Sebastián’s cancer. michael@curemec.org

The cureMEC core team is united by a shared purpose—to advance research, awareness, and hope for those affected by myoepithelial carcinoma. Drawing on decades of leadership in advocacy, art, and science, co-founders Michael Casaus and Naomi Natale, together with Director of Research Dr. Jamie Dempsey Barber, combine personal dedication and professional expertise to drive meaningful progress toward a cure.

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  • Co-Founder

    Naomi is the proud mother to Santiago and Sebastián. She has over 18+ years experience creating and directing national and international socially engaged art projects that bring people together to address social issues. She is the artist behind One Million Bones, a social practice work in which over 150,000 people from fifty states and thirty countries created over 1,000,000 handmade bones to address ongoing genocide and mass atrocities in Sudan, South Sudan, Congo, Myanmar, and Syria. In June of 2013, 1,018,260 bones were installed on the National Mall in Washington, DC. Currently, she is a 2025 Artists at Work Fellow working on Of Grief & Dreams, a project created for individual and communal healing. She is a TED Global Fellow, TED Senior Fellow, a Robert Rauschenberg Foundation’s Artist as Activist Fellow, a Carl Wilkens Fellow, and a recipient of an Arts and Healing Network Award. naomi@curemec.org

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  • Director of Research

    Jamie Dempsey Barber, Ph.D., serves as the Director of Research at cureMEC, bringing a deep commitment to advancing therapies for rare cancers.

    She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology from Austin Peay State University and completed a post-baccalaureate fellowship at the National Cancer Institute before earning her Ph.D. in Cell Biology from Harvard Medical School, where her thesis research explored mTOR signaling and alternative splicing regulation. Following her doctoral work, Jamie combined research and teaching as an Instructor for the Biology of Cancer course at Harvard Extension School, and later helped launch and grow SHEPHERD biotech, a company dedicated to developing therapies for rare cancer patients. She also leads scientific collaborations at CANCollaborate, a nonprofit initiative accelerating research by connecting leaders across academia, industry, and advocacy.

    At cureMEC, Jamie integrates her scientific expertise, biotech experience, and collaborative vision to expand research opportunities and drive progress for patients facing myoepithelial carcinoma. jamie@curemec.org

MEET OUR SCIENTIFIC ADVISORS

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  • VP EXTERNAL RESEARCH & PARTNERSHIPS
    PRECEDE BIOSCIENCES

    Painter is the VP of External Research & Partnerships with Precede Biosciences, an early stage liquid biopsy company, where she drives external research and collaborations focused on maximizing the impact of a novel technology to improve the lives of patients. Painter is the former Deputy Director and remains a Strategic Advisor to Count Me In, a patient-partnered genomics initiative of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. A trained cancer research scientist with a Ph.D. in biochemistry, Painter co-developed and oversaw the creation of a nation-wide clinico-genomics data platform built in lockstep with the community of cancer patients reflected in each study. Painter, an angiosarcoma survivor, is also a passionate leading patient advocate who co-founded and serves as the President of Angiosarcoma Awareness, an organization that supports research and awareness efforts surrounding this disease.

At cureMEC, we are committed to funding meaningful, high-impact research that brings us closer to better treatments—and one day, a cure—for Myoepithelial Carcinoma (MEC). Our Scientific Advisory Board plays a critical role in shaping our research priorities, evaluating funding opportunities, and ensuring that every initiative we support is grounded in scientific excellence and strategic vision.

These respected leaders in rare cancer research and advocacy bring deep knowledge, experience, and compassion to our mission.

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  • CO-FOUNDER & PRESIDENT
    CANCOLLABORATE

    Jane is the president and co-founder of CANCollaborate, a non-profit 501(c)(3) dedicated to fostering communication, cooperation and collaborations among researchers and institutions with the goal of accelerating treatments and cures for diseases. She is also an advisor and board member to several rare cancer foundations including RCRF, Brave Like Gabe, Alliance for Rare Cancer and Cancer Patient Lab. Jane is a scientific operations and alliance management executive with 20+ years of creating and delivering complex scientific goals. Jane’s scientific career began at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Genome Center, UK where she worked closely with Sir John Sulston on the C.elegans genome project. She was an early leader on the Human Genome Project, leading the Chromosome 1 initiative. In 1998 she made the leap across the Atlantic to Cambridge, MA, where she led a new directive in plant genomics for Monsanto Company. Jane worked on various initiatives at the Broad Institute for eighteen years as the Senior Director for Genomics Alliances. She created and led many projects including a new whole genome approach to the Mouse Genome Project as well as collaborative initiatives across Cancer, Mendelian, Infectious and Common Diseases. Her collaborations and partnerships have spread across the globe and have touched many groups from non-profit research teams to large pharma.

How They Support Our Mission

  • Evaluate research proposals and advise on scientific strategy

  • Recommend partnerships and collaborative initiative

  • Ensure patient-centered research priorities

  • Support the development of patient registries and data-sharing platforms

Our advisors help ensure that cureMEC’s work is not only guided by science—but by compassion, collaboration, and a bold vision for the future of MEC research.