Professor Leah Cowen has pioneered genome-scale analyses of deadly fungal pathogens to understand how they cause disease and evolve resistance to the limited arsenal of drugs available to kill them. Her interdisciplinary approaches to understand host-pathogen interactions and identify new antifungals and their targets have catalyzed the discovery of novel strategies to treat fungal infectious disease. Cowen is developing life-saving medicines as co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Bright Angel Therapeutics and is transforming global scientific communities by leading both the CIFAR Fungal Kingdom: Threats & Opportunities program and the research and innovation enterprise for the top-ranking university in Canada.