Leonard Klevan

Leonard Klevan is a businessman and scientist in the fields of biochemistry and biotechnology. As of 2009 Klevan has assumed the position of president of the Human Identification Business of Life Technologies (formerly Applied Biosystems Inc.) Prior to the merging of Applied Biosystems Inc. (ABI) with Invitrogen under the name of Life Technologies, Klevan acted as president of Applied Markets for ABI which produced and marketed reagent kits for forensic DNA, paternity testing and other forms of human identification as well as products for biosecurity, food/agriculture, and environmental applications.

Early life and education
Leonard Klevan was born in New York in 1951 to Julius and Shirly Klevan. He received a B.A. in chemistry from Binghamton University and a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from Yale University in 1978. He went on to do postdoctoral research at Harvard University.

Career
After leaving Harvard, Klevan spent a short period of time as an adjunct professor at UCLA before moving to Maryland to work for Life Technologies Inc. (a predecessor to the Life Technologies Inc. he currently works for). In 1999 he left Life Technologies and moved to the San Francisco Bay area to become President and CEO of MiraiBio (a subsidiary of Hitachi Software Engineering). In 2005 Klevan moved to Metairie, Louisiana (a suburb of New Orleans) where he was CEO of Reliagene Technologies, a forensic testing and human identification company. ReliaGene, a privately held company founded by Dr. Sudhir Sinha in 1990 was expanding and hired Dr Klevan to grow the company further and provide corporate structure. Shortly after Hurricane Katrina, Dr. Klevan returned to California as vice president of applied markets at ABI. In 2008 ABI merged with Invitrogen under the name Life Technologies Inc. He is currently president of the Human Identification Business of Life Technologies. Klevan frequently travels abroad to meet with foreign government agencies and officials to consult on issues of forensic science and DNA databasing.

Awards
In 2008 Klevan received the National Center For Victims of Crime Annual Achievement Award for his work with missing persons.