Steven R. Hursh, Ph.D.

Steven R. Hursh, Ph.D.

IBR President and Chief Scientist

Dr. Steve Hursh is President and Chief Scientist of the Institutes for Behavior Resources, where he directs research and application efforts on human performance and fatigue, behavioral economics, drug abuse, and cooperative team performance.  He is also Adjunct Professor of Behavioral Biology in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.  Dr. Hursh’s leadership of IBR builds on a distinguished career both as a behavioral researcher and research manager, including 23 years of experience as a scientist in the US Army, serving as the consultant to the Army Surgeon General for Research Psychology, Director of the Division of Neuropsychiatry at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, and as a medical staff officer in the Pentagon, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army (Research, Development, and Acquisition).  Dr. Hursh is a world leader in theory and modeling in the Behavioral Economics subfield of Psychology as defined by the application of economic concepts and metrics to individual and group behavior.  In addition, Dr. Hursh is also a technical leader of an effort to model the relationship between sleep deprivation and performance.  His patented biomathematical model–the Sleep, Activity, Fatigue, and Task Effectiveness or SAFTE™ model–has been accepted by the US Department of Defense as the standard warfighter fatigue model, has been validated and calibrated by the Department of Transportation as a fatigue risk management tool, and is currently used by the Federal Railroad Administration, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to assess fatigue in transportation operations.  He is also the co-inventor of the FAST™ (Fatigue Avoidance Scheduling Tool) and FAST Aviation computer programs used by government agencies and various industries to assess and manage fatigue in operational settings.  Dr. Hursh earned his B.A. in Psychology from Wake Forest University and Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from the University of California, San Diego.  Over his 35 years in research, Steve has authored or co-authored over 65 published articles, book chapters, and technical reports, and served as associate editor of the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior.

Chief Operating Officer

Mr. Reid Blank is Chief Operating Officer at the Institutes for Behavior Resources, where he directs and coordinates IBR’s marketing, communications, contract management, and organizational development initiatives.  He earned his M.B.A. in International Business Management from the Thunderbird School of Global Management in Glendale, AZ.  Mr. Blank has nearly 30 years of business development and administrative operations experience in sleep and fatigue management.  Reid was founder of The Big Sleep Show®, the first-ever consumer health event for sleep and alertness, served as Vice President of Alertness Solutions, a private fatigue management consulting firm, and Associate Executive Director of the nonprofit National Sleep Foundation.

Vickie L. Walters, LCSW-C

Vickie L. Walters, LCSW-C

Executive Director, REACH Health Services

Ms. Vickie Walters is Executive Director of the REACH Health Services substance abuse treatment program at the Institutes for Behavior Resources, where she oversees daily operations, ensures quality clinical services, and manages fiscal responsibility within the program.  In addition, Ms. Walters is responsible for continued development within REACH, including active advocacy and continued engagement in implementing program refinements, expansion of clinical services, and integration with research initiatives.  Ms. Walters has more than 25 years of experience in the addiction treatment field, including an 8-year term as Director of the renowned Center for Addiction and Pregnancy at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Bayview Medical Center prior to joining IBR.

Jaime K. Devine, PhD

Jaime K. Devine, PhD

Director of Sleep Science

Dr. Jaime K Devine, PhD is an Operational Fatigue and Performance scientist at IBR with over 15 years of experience in behavioral neuroscience and sleep research. Dr. Devine holds a PhD in Neuroscience from Brandeis University and Certificates in Sleep Medicine and Biostatistics from Harvard Medical School as a member of the Human Sleep and Inflammatory Systems Laboratory investigating the interaction between sleep, fatigue, and pain. Prior to joining IBR, she was an experimental health stress scientist at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research Sleep Research Center and Operation Research Team. Dr. Devine is a subject matter expert in sleep behavior in operational populations and the use of wearable technologies for scientific data collection.

Derek D. Reed, PhD

Derek D. Reed, PhD, BCBA-D

Director of Applied Behavioral Sciences

Dr. Derek Reed is Director of Applied Behavioral Sciences at Institutes for Behavior Resources, Inc., with over 20 years of experience in behavior analysis and behavioral economics. He has served as Associate Editor for the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, Behavior Analysis in Practice, and The Psychological Record. Dr. Reed has over 180 publications, coauthored three edited books and one textbook, and has won numerous awards for his scholarship, such as the American Psychological Association Division 25 B. F. Skinner Foundation New Applied Researcher Award, the Society for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior Don Hake Award for Translational Research, and the Federation of Associations in Behavioral and Brain Sciences Early Career Award. He served as Coordinator of the Association for Behavior Analysis International’s Science Board and on the Board of Directors for the Society for the Quantitative Analyses of Behavior, of which he was previously Executive Director. Dr. Reed’s research focuses on the application of behavioral economic principles to improve issues of societal concern.

G. Malik Burnett, MD, MBA, MPH

Medical Director, REACH Health Services

As a physician, entrepreneur, and drug policy expert, Dr. Malik Burnett works to advance the broader drug policy reform agenda with the goal of shifting US drug policy from a framework based on criminal justice to one based on public health. In addition to his role as Medical Director of REACH Health Services, he currently serves as the Medical Director for the Maryland Department of Health’s Center for Harm Reduction Services, an Assistant Professor in Addiction Medicine at the University of Maryland Midtown Campus and as a consultant for the Maryland Addiction Consultation Service. Additionally, he serves on the American Society of Addiction Medicine Public Policy and Legislative Advocacy Committees. He attended Duke University where he completed his undergraduate, medical school and business school. He earned his MPH from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and completed his residency training in general preventive medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital and his addiction medicine fellowship at the University of Maryland Medical Center.

Roshni Patel, CPA

Director of Finance

Ms. Roshni Patel has been IBR’s Director of Finance since 2006 and has more than 10 years experience in corporate accounting.  Ms. Patel is responsible for all financial reporting and analysis, annual audit preparation, non-profit financial administration, and oversight of financial accounting for all IBR programs and services.  Roshni is a licensed Certified Public Accountant and a graduate of the University of Texas with a B.A. in Business Administration in Accounting.

Jake Choynowski

Data Scientist

Jake Choynowski is a data scientist on the research team at IBR. He has nearly a decade of experience operating in both clinical and operational sleep and performance research as a lab technician, research coordinator, and research associate before becoming a data scientist. Jake spent five years working in the Sleep Research Center and Operational Research Team at the Center for Military Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR). In his position at WRAIR, Jake handled a number of studies that required him to work in the field alongside warfighters throughout their deployment and training cycles to study sleep health and performance outcomes. During this period, Jake was also responsible for data engineering and automating the large flow of data from collection to analysis and reporting to leadership. Jake has published and presented on the findings of these studies as well as data mining healthcare databases and creating novel research methodologies for wearable devices.