Dezi Elzinga
Business Development & Licensing Associate
Dezi Elzinga is a Business Development and Licensing Associate at Cornell’s Center for Technology Licensing (CTL). Her work includes evaluating invention disclosures, contributing to patent strategy, and supporting the development and management of patent portfolios, with a focus on engaging faculty inventors to advance translational research in the agrifood and life sciences sectors.
Most recently, Dezi served as Senior Scientist at Zymtronix Catalytic Systems in Ithaca, where she acted as a scientific and commercialization liaison between academic collaborators, internal R&D teams, and external partners. Prior to that, she held postdoctoral positions at UC Riverside, working on CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing, transcriptomics, quantitative phenotyping, and biophysical assays — integrating chemical biology, genomics, protein engineering, and plant physiology to investigate abiotic and biotic stress responses in plants.
Dezi holds a Ph.D. in Plant Biology from Cornell University and a B.S. in Environmental Biology/Botany from Michigan State University. She is also an inventor on patents related to herbicide enhancer compositions, biopesticides, and a gene-editing delivery system for insect pests.
