Douglas Lewis, President and Scientific Director

Douglas Lewis is now serving his 20th year as president and scientific director of USDTL. Prior to USDTL, he spent five years in academia as an assistant professor of clinical pathology at Northwestern University Medical School while also serving as the head of the toxicology section at the Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago. During his tenure at Northwestern and Children’s, Lewis established the first non-Olympic anabolic steroids testing laboratory in the United States and was a toxicologist for the U.S. Weight Lifting Federation. He also began developing new specimens such as meconium for use in diagnosing substance-exposed newborns.

Lewis is recognized as an expert in athletic drug testing and substance-exposed babies testing, and by his peers as one of the 25 most prominent toxicologists in the country. He is also credited with obtaining federal SAMHSA certification for two laboratories prior to forming USDTL. He was a co-principal investigator on a $6.57 million NIDA funded grant entitled "Prenatal Methamphetamine Exposure and Child Outcome," co-investigator on three Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I grants—“Diagnostic Viability of Umbilical Cord Specimens,” “Using Human Hair to Determine Long Term Alcohol Abuse” and “Hair Ethyl Glucuronide as a Long-Term Alcohol Biomarker”—and co-investigator on an SBIR Phase II grant “Diagnostic Viability of Umbilical Cord Specimens“.

Joseph Jones, MS, NRCC-TC, Vice President Laboratory Operations

Joseph Jones has over 20 years of experience in the forensic toxicology industry. He earned a Bachelor of Science in chemistry at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a Master of Science in chemistry at North Carolina Central University. Jones began his career at CompuChem Laboratories in Research Triangle Park, N.C., which was one of the first laboratories in the country certified by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to perform testing on federally mandated specimens. In 2000, he came to USDTL as Laboratory Manager and was later promoted to his current position of Vice President Laboratory Operations. The National Registry of Certified Chemists lists Jones as a Toxicological Chemist. Jones has provided expert testimony in a variety of venues throughout the country.

Charles A. Plate, Ph.D., Laboratory Directory

Charles Plate is a highly respected scientist with experience in both the academic and industrial sectors. He received his doctorate in biochemistry from Duke University Medical Center, and then spent two years as an American Cancer Society postdoctoral fellow and six years as a research associate with Nobel Laureate Salvador Luria at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Plate then assumed the position of assistant professor of microbiology-immunology at Northwestern University Medical School and carried out research in microbial bioenergetics. In 1985, Plate joined Abbott Laboratories’ Diagnostics Division as a senior scientist and subsequently served on two business teams as a technical specialist. In 1999, Plate became the director of research and development for Avitar Technologies, Inc., where he established a GMP facility for making and testing self-performing lateral flow strips that detected drugs of abuse in oral fluid. In 2004, Plate assumed the position of laboratory director at USDTL, where he also supervises research and development. In his time at USDTL, Plate has succeeded in securing over $2 million in Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.