Our Story

The scope of experience of Polaris’s executive team spans nine decades & several fields, including military service, medicine, & federal research & development. These experiences have allowed the team to cultivate timely knowledge of pandemic-era mental health needs, & develop deeply unique qualifications to address these needs. The team has garnered numerous awards, ranks, titles, & accomplishments, ranging from captain to engineer, Purple Heart recipient to medical doctor, virologist & immunologist, 9/11 first responder to Iraq War veteran, & PhD to Homeland Security Public Health Officer amid the threats of SARS & anthrax.

In 2017, inspired by their work at the Defense & Veterans Brain Injury Center & the US Department of Veterans Affairs, a veteran & a scientist coalesced their visions seeded in service around the urgent need for 21st-century innovation in behavioral healthcare. Drawing upon decades of experience in biomedical technology, public health, & molecular biology, they founded a company to take aim at the mental health crisis that results in 22 veteran suicides each day. Partnering with the Illumina Accelerator & scientists from Mount Sinai & the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry, the team developed the first-to-market, patented genomic biomarker assay to identify PTSD risk in 2018.

As a veteran-owned business, our roots remain in our founding mission to improve the lives of US military service members & veterans living with behavioral health conditions, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In 2020, global public health events & an evolving behavioral health landscape revealed that the number of people standing to benefit from advances in diagnostics & treatment is broadening by the day.

Guided by a calling to serve, Polaris expanded its mission to encompass a broader range of populations, including:

• Veterans & active-duty US military service members,
• First responders, frontline workers, & individuals in high-risk occupations, &
• Trauma-exposed communities at large.