Dr. Cynthia Bamdad, CEO/CSO
Dr. Bamdad was a pioneer in the field of biochips and is now recognized as a leader in the field of cancer stem cells and cancer immunotherapy. Dr. Bamdad holds a B.S. in Physics from Northeastern University and a Ph.D. in Biophysics from Harvard University, where she was a Howard Hughes Doctoral Fellow. While a Ph.D. student at Harvard, Dr. Bamdad invented the first electronic DNA chip and the first universal protein chip. Intellectual property surrounding these inventions and extensions thereof, also developed by Dr. Bamdad, formed the cornerstone of a California startup company, which was sold within two years to Motorola for $300 million and is now GenMark. Dr. Bamdad’s invention is now an FDA-approved medical device that electronically reads patient DNA in real-time.
Dr. Bamdad was invited to join the Board of Directors for Pharmacyclics (PCYC), when a major shareholder took over the company in 2008. Dr. Bamdad’s role on the Board from 2008 - 2011 was to assess the strength of each program and advise as to whether to progress, partner or drop. Dr. Bamdad advised to drop 5 of the 7 programs, partner 1 and push, as lead program the BTK inhibitor, now known as Imbruvica. When Dr. Bamdad joined PCYC BOD in 2008, the Company was valued at $15M. Under the new strategy, PCYC sold 49% to J&J for just under $1B in 2011 and a little more than 3 years later sold the other 50% to Abbvie for $21B. Imbruvica is the most successful drug to date for hematological cancers.
Dr. Bamdad has been the Principal Investigator on grants and contracts from the National Cancer Institute, National Institute for Mental Health, National Science Foundation, The Huntington Foundation, National Institute of General Medicine, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and the Advanced Technology Program (ATP). Dr. Bamdad has served on special committees to advise research arms of the military on the technical challenges of detecting biological warfare agents (BWA). Dr. Bamdad has also given numerous invited talks to U.S. and foreign institutions on the topics of cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, and biological warfare threat and detection. Dr. Bamdad has also served on the Board of Directors Northeastern University’s School of Social Science, Urban Affairs & Public Policy.
Dr. Bamdad is the sole or co-inventor inventor of over 160 patent applications in the United States and foreign jurisdictions for novel technologies, therapeutics and diagnostics.
Dr. Bamdad oversees all corporate strategy, and scientific and business operations of the company.
Ron Axelrod, COO
Mr. Axelrod was member of the Crew team at Boston University and rowed in the Head of the Charles until 2006. After completing his degree in Biomedical Engineering, Mr. Axelrod joined the Jet Engine Division of GE, where he worked for ten years. Mr. Axelrod then started a business of brokering networking and communications equipment. In the days before internet auction sites, Ron traveled the country buying out computer lots at auctions and re-selling on the secondary market. Ron has traveled extensively around the globe, currently having visited over 115 countries. In 2005, Ron was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and a related platelet disorder. This was the beginning of Ron’s journey into the frontiers of Regenerative Medicine. He started working with Minerva in 2005 when the Company first discovered that the same growth factor receptor and growth factor that mediate the growth of 75% of all solid tumor cancers – MUC1* and NME’s – also mediate the growth of all human pluripotent stem cells. Ron has been a patient advocate for cell based therapies for MS and for cancers.
At Minerva, Mr. Axelrod is responsible for corporate development, investor relations, facilities and operations, accounting and finance, IT, and procurement. He has raised over $100M in private equity investment for Minerva, which has preserved shareholder value through a strategy of delaying venture capital and institutional investment until a time just prior to initial public offering.
Dr. Andrew Stewart, Project Manager
Dr. Stewart received his B. Sc. (Hons) in Physiology from University of Glasgow and his D. Phil. from Oxford. After Oxford, as a Wellcome Trust International Research Fellow, he spent his post-doc at Harvard Medical School studying genetic disease and renal physiology. During this period, he was also a visiting research fellow at Nagoya University (Japan). He joined Minerva Biotechnologies as a Research Scientist in 2011 and became Project Manager in 2014. He has co-led and managed numerous projects in developing anti-cancer therapeutics including small molecule and antibody therapeutics for the treatment of MUC1*-positive cancers; in vitro assay development and in vivo studies, and developing novel stem cell reagents for the growth and maintenance of “naïve state” pluripotent stem cells, as well as the development of cell-type specific differentiation protocols.
Dr. Scott Moe, Head of Chemistry.
Dr. Moe received his Ph. D. in Medicinal Chemistry from the University of Iowa and was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Minnesota College of Pharmacy. Prior to Minerva, Dr. Moe was at NPS Pharmaceuticals, where he was co-inventor of Cinacalcet, a drug sold in North America by Amgen under the trade name Sensipar®. He is also a co-inventor of Delucemine, a long-acting, orally bioavailable NMDA receptor antagonist that reached Phase IIb human clinical trials for the treatment of Ischemic Stroke. Over his career he has been the co-inventor on innumerous compounds for a broad array of diseases and biological targets.
At Minerva, Dr. Moe leads the Chemistry Team, which designs small molecules for drug discovery research, synthesizes novel new chemical entities, analytical and pharmacokinetic analysis, bioanalytical assay method development and support, GMP manufacturing, and chemistry support for ongoing biological projects. He consulted for Minerva beginning in 2006 and joined the company full time in 2011.