By Jody Godoy

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes must begin serving her prison sentence while she appeals her conviction on charges of defrauding investors in the failed blood-testing startup, an appeals court in San Francisco ruled on Tuesday.

Holmes, who rose to fame after claiming Theranos' small machines could run an array of diagnostic tests with just a few drops of blood, was convicted at trial in San Jose, California, last year and sentenced to 11 years and three months in prison.

She had asked the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to pause her sentence on April 25, two days before she was to report to prison. The court on Tuesday denied her bail application.

(Reporting by Jody Godoy in California; Additional reporting by Akanksha Khushi; Editing by Richard Chang and Edwina Gibbs)