About Berkwood

Built for the distance between knowing and deciding.

Berkwood Research is a compact scientific consultancy for organizations that need more than information. We assemble the relevant evidence, expose the uncertainty, and help leaders decide what the science means for the work in front of them.

Where the work has to hold up

Evidence earns its value when it survives contact with expertise, institutions, and real decisions.

Scientific work fails when the evidence is weak. It can also fail when good evidence is flattened into a slogan, when uncertainty is hidden, or when a correct analysis never becomes usable to the person making the decision.

Berkwood was built for that second failure mode. We combine research depth, methodological discipline, and strategic storytelling so that the reasoning beneath a recommendation remains visible.

We are

Independent and evidence-led
Candid about uncertainty
Invested in the decision beyond the deliverable

We are not

A volume content shop
A predetermined advocacy voice
A literature-summary service with strategy added afterward

Robert Bergia presenting at a scientific meeting — From the podium · March 2026
Robert Bergia presenting on emerging obesity medications, March 2026.

The team

Stronger answers come from more than one discipline.

Scientific synthesis, clinical perspective, systems biology, quantitative methods, and the candor to make one another’s conclusions better.

Founder & Principal

Robert Bergia, PhD, MBA

“He systematized, but above all he assembled.” — Alfred North Whitehead

Dr. Robert Bergia is a translational health scientist and strategic advisor who helps organizations make sense of emerging evidence across the health, nutrition, and aging sectors. He specializes in synthesizing complex and rapidly evolving science into clear strategy, product positioning, and stakeholder communication, connecting what the evidence says to what organizations should do with it.

As founder and principal of Berkwood Research, Robert partners with companies, trade associations, and startups to turn scientific evidence into actionable intelligence. His areas of focus span personalized nutrition, protein metabolism, dietary patterning, emerging obesity pharmacotherapy, and healthy aging. He has authored more than two dozen peer-reviewed publications and has served in scientific advisory and board leadership roles across the nutrition and health sciences industries.

Prior to founding Berkwood, Robert worked in R&D at ADM, where he led protein nutrition research, shaped science-backed product narratives, and conducted R&D assessments supporting M&A decisions. His career has spanned academic research, industry, and consulting, giving him a distinctive ability to bridge laboratory evidence with business decision-making.

Robert earned his B.S. in Nutrition Sciences from Penn State, his M.S. in Health Sciences from Georgia State University, a dual-title PhD in Nutrition Science and Gerontology from Purdue University, and an MBA with High Honors from Boston University.

Outside of work, Robert can usually be found hiking the mountains around Santa Barbara, biking with his daughter, or, if he is being honest, leading a group of fellow gamer-dads through a World of Warcraft dungeon.

LinkedIn Google Scholar Selected work

Lead Evidence Analyst

Ethan Braun, RDN

“All models are wrong, but some are useful.” — George Box

Ethan Braun is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist with extensive research experience at Purdue University. He specializes in evidence appraisal and interpretation, routinely distinguishing meaningful signals from statistical noise.

At Berkwood Research, Ethan is both an analyst and a thought partner. He stress-tests methods, grades the strength and relevance of evidence, and brings clarity to dense literature while serving as a trusted sounding board for the direction of the work.

Ethan's clinical background keeps often-abstract research findings connected to real people and real decisions. His systematic, detail-oriented approach also strengthens Berkwood's evidence workflows, helping the team turn large bodies of research into traceable conclusions and practical recommendations.

Research Scientist

Christian Wright, PhD

“Read not to contradict and confute, but to weigh and consider.” — Francis Bacon

Dr. Christian Wright is a clinical and translational scientist who brings uncommon breadth across clinical research, preclinical modeling, and modern data science, helping teams move from interesting results to decisions they can defend. He holds a PhD in Nutrition Science from Purdue University and completed postdoctoral training in molecular biomechanics at Indiana University, where his work examined cardiometabolic and musculoskeletal health through multi-omics approaches.

With more than 13 years of experience spanning human interventions, transgenic models, molecular biomechanics, and multi-omics analysis, Christian sees the architecture within complex biological data, not just the individual findings. His experience managing clinical studies and regulatory-grade documentation in the medical-device industry adds a practical fluency in precision, traceability, and the standards evidence must meet outside academia.

At Berkwood Research, Christian leads systematic evidence synthesis and serves as a framework architect. He stress-tests methods, integrates mechanistic and clinical endpoints, and helps ensure that the scaffolding beneath a conclusion is as sound as the conclusion itself.

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Technical Partner, AI & Quantitative Methods

Tatiane Pereira dos Santos, PhD

“Nothing in life is to be feared; it is only to be understood.” — Marie Curie

Dr. Tatiane Pereira dos Santos is a physicist and programmer working in quantum computing. She brings the habits of a physicist to Berkwood's most technically demanding questions: define the system carefully, make uncertainty explicit, and ensure that the result can be reproduced rather than merely admired.

As a long-running technical partner to Berkwood, Tatiane provides depth in quantitative methods, computational verification, and the engineering discipline behind the firm's AI-assisted evidence systems. Her work strengthens reproducible analyses, uncertainty quantification, model selection, citation verification, and the quiet infrastructure that keeps complex workflows from failing silently.

Tatiane's role is deliberately that of a rigorous technical backstop. She helps Berkwood reach analytical questions that would otherwise remain out of range and makes sure the firm's private tools reinforce, rather than replace, warranted scientific judgment.

Operating principles

The standards are not decoration. They are the method.

Evidence before assertion

The strength of the claim never exceeds the strength and relevance of the evidence beneath it.

Uncertainty stays visible

Fragility is information. We name what is inferred, borrowed, contested, or simply not known.

Reasoning travels with the answer

A recommendation is more durable when your team can see how it was assembled.

Translation is part of rigor

The work is not finished until the audience can understand the decision and its limits.

The next question

Need someone who can stand behind the interpretation?

Bring Berkwood into the work before the position hardens and while the evidence can still change the decision.

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