Scientific Advisory Board
Michael Atkins, MD.
Dr. Atkins is Deputy Director of the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center in Washington, DC and Professor of Oncology and Medicine (Hematology/Oncology) at Georgetown University School of Medicine. He began his career at Tufts Medical Center before moving to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and being appointed Professor at Harvard Medical School where he served as Deputy Chief of the Division of Hematology/Oncology and leader of the Biologic Therapy and Cutaneous Oncology Programs, as well as Co-PI of the Harvard Skin Cancer SPORE, leader of the Dana Farber Harvard Cancer Center Kidney Cancer Program and Director of the DF/HCC Kidney Cancer SPORE. In 2012, he became the Deputy Director of the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center and William M. Scholl Professor and Vice Chair of the Department of Oncology. He is the former president of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer and currently co-Chair of the Melanoma Research Foundation Scientific Advisory Council. His current research focuses on immunotherapy for melanoma, renal cell carcinoma, and predictive biomarkers for biologic therapy response.
Rakesh Jain, Ph.D.
Dr. Rakesh Jain is widely known for revealing how the abnormal tumor microenvironment fuels tumor progression and confers treatment resistance; developing innovative strategies to “normalize” the microenvironment; and then translating these strategies from bench to bedside. He currently serves as the Andrew Werk Cook Professor of Radiation Oncology (Tumor Biology) at Harvard Medical School, and Director of the Edwin L. Steele Laboratories at Massachusetts General Hospital. A recipient of more than 90 awards, Dr. Jain has the rare distinction of being a member of all three US National Academies –Sciences, Engineering and Medicine – as well as the National Academy of Inventors and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He received the 2013 US National Medal of Science (for biological sciences) from President Obama “For pioneering research at the interface of engineering and oncology, including tumor microenvironment, drug delivery, and imaging; and for discovering groundbreaking principles guiding the development and novel use of drugs for cancer and non-cancerous diseases.”
Dennis Benjamin, Ph.D.
Dr. Benjamin is the former SVP of Research at Seattle Genetics where he was a key developer of the company’s ADC technology. Prior to Seattle Genetics he worked at Praecis Pharmaceuticals and Genetics Institute, advancing DNA encoded libraries and working in protein and small molecule discovery. Over his career he has led teams that have discovered 25 biologics and small molecules that entered clinical trials and contributed to 4 drug approvals. He is currently an advisor and SAB member at several start-up biotechnology companies.
Charles Zhao, M.D., MBA, brings more than 20 years of drug development experience in oncology therapeutic area. Before Elpis, Charles served as CMO at ABM Therapeutics and Sr. Medical Director at Mirati Therapeutics. Previously, he was Medical Director at EMD Serono working on cMET inhibitor global program in hepatocellular carcinoma indication; MEK inhibitor early phase development program in multiple indications including pancreatic cancer, ovarian cancer, melanoma, NSCLC, CRC, TNBC, and CML; and MetAP2 inhibitor early phase development program. He was Associate Medical Director at Boehringer Ingelheim working on PLK1 inhibitor in urothelial carcinoma and AML indication. His career highlights also include his work at Novartis working on HDAC inhibitor in CTCL and PKC inhibitor in AML indication, and Eli Lilly in early phase clinical development.
Diala Ezzeddine, Ph.D. Diala is founder and CEO of Xios Therapeutics (Waltham, MA), a privately held, venture-backed drug discovery company. Xios is developing next generation oncology protein degrading therapeutics with the potential to transform the treatment and lives of cancer patients. From 2010 to 2015, Diala was EVP and Chief Business Officer of X-Chem. She was instrumental in crafting the company’s business strategy, obtaining an equity investment, and establishing multiple revenue generating partnerships with top tier pharmaceutical companies with a cumulative deal value surpassing $2B. In the course of her career, Diala held business development roles of increasing responsibility at several leading biotechnology companies in the Boston area including Millennium Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA, now Takeda Pharmaceuticals), and Archemix Corp. (Cambridge, MA). In support of the companies’ corporate strategies, she structured and negotiated value creating partnerships with several of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies. Diala holds a Ph.D. in Genetics from Harvard Medical School obtained in 1997. Before that, she had conducted research in the Neurogenetics department at Massachusetts General Hospital (Boston, MA). She is the lead author on a publication describing successful in vivo pre-clinical proof-of-concept for an innovative genetic engineering approach to treating malignant brain tumors.
Ahmad is the Vice President of Business Development and Corporate Strategy. Previously, he held roles in business development and corporate strategy at Epizyme and Momenta Pharmaceuticals. His diverse drug development experience includes roles in management consulting, commercial strategy, corporate finance, and program and portfolio management. Ahmad started his career in drug discovery as a research scientist at Abbvie, Vertex and Chiron. He holds a B.S in Chemistry from University of Massachusetts, an M.S. in Pharmacology from Northeastern University, and an MBA from F.W. Olin College of Business at Babson College.
Yan Chen, PhD: Founder, President and CEO. Yan brings more than 20 years of expertise in both mRNA display technology and biologic drug discovery in the oncology disease area. She was Biotherapeutics Discovery Head at Juno Therapeutics in Boston and Senior Vice President of Research at X-Body Biosciences which was acquired by Juno in 2015. Previously, she was an investigator and project leader in Oncology Biotherapeutics at Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research. Earlier in her career, she was a scientist at Phylos and Adnexus playing instrumental roles in establishing the mRNA antibody and protein display technology platforms. Yan was a postdoctoral trainee in Immunology at Tufts Medical School and received her PhD in Tumor Immunology from National University of Singapore. She is the co-inventor of more than 20 antibody technologies and biologic therapeutics patents.
Kehao Zhao, PhD: Co-founder, Chief Scientific Officer. Kehao brings more than 15 years of drug discovery experience in disease areas including cancer, liver disease and ophthalmology. Before Elpis, Kehao was a senior investigator at Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research leading antibody therapeutics platform and cancer epigenetics research. Previously, Kehao was a scientist at Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals. Kehao completed postdoctoral training in Gene Expression & Regulation at the Wistar institute and received his PhD from the Institute of Biophysics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Kehao has published over 30 research papers in prestigious scientific journals.