About Exosome Diagnostics, Inc.
Exosome Diagnostics, Inc. is focused on commercializing proprietary genetics based diagnostics in oncology and endocrinology.
Our lead commercial effort is the development of a series of oncology diagnostics based on our proprietary exosome/RNA genetic discovery platform. We believe our exosome/RNA technology can form the basis for a change in standard of care for early diagnosis, confirmation, and monitoring therapeutic effectiveness for various forms of cancers.
Management & Directors
James R. McCullough
Chairman & Chief Executive Officer
Mr. McCullough is one of our founders and has been Chairman and Chief Executive Officer since inception in May of 2008. From March of 2001 to October of 2006, Mr. McCullough was the Chief Executive Officer of AusAm Biotechnologies, Inc. a biotechnology company developing diagnostics and therapeutics to identify and treat kidney, cardiovascular and infectious diseases. At AusAm, Mr. McCullough oversaw commercial development, FDA clearance, and marketing and distribution for Accumin, a diagnostic for detection of patients at risk for early stage kidney and cardiovascular disease. In addition, Mr. McCullough assembled a world class management, board of directors and scientific advisory team from senior executives of Quest Diagnostics, Johnson & Johnson, Bayer, the World Health Organization, The National Kidney Foundation, the Food & Drug Administration, National Institutes of Health, Lehman Brothers, and Trust Company of the West. From 1995 to 2000, Mr. McCullough served as a General Partner in the Renwick Special Situations Fund, L.P., a private partnership focusing on investments in early stage technology companies. Mr. McCullough is currently an Executive-in-Residence at Hudson/Brightwaters, a life sciences merchant bank with offices New York and Los Angeles and serves as a Director of Aleutian Restructuring Group, LLC, a corporate turn-around and restructuring consultant firm. He received his B.A. from Boston University in 1990, and his MBA from the Columbia Graduate School of Business in 1995.
Wayne D. Comper Ph.D., DSc
Chief Science Officer
Dr. Comper is one of our founders and has been a Director and Chief Science Officer since inception. From March of 2001 to October of 2006, Dr. Comper was Chief Science Officer of AusAm Biotechnologies, Inc., a biotechnology company developing diagnostics and therapeutics to identify and treat kidney, cardiovascular and infectious diseases. From 1991 until 2004, Dr. Comper was Reader of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia. He has an international profile as a research scientist in the biomedical arena. From 1974 to 1976, Dr. Comper was a postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago. From 1976 to 1978, he was a visiting scientist in the Department of Medical and Physiological Chemistry, Uppsala University, Sweden. In 1988, he was a Visiting Professor, Nephrology Section, Rush Medical School, Chicago, Illinois. He was awarded the 1992 Silver Jubilee Prize for Research at Monash University, where he also holds a Doctor of Science Degree. He has published over 160 research articles in peer-reviewed international journals. His research has attracted grants from the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, the Diabetes Foundation of Australia, The Australian Kidney Foundation and the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation International.
Sara Barrington
Chief Financial Officer
Sara Barrington is our Chief Financial Officer. She was previously Chief Financial Officer of Creative Technology Group, Inc from November 2005. From March of 2001 to October 2005, Ms. Barrington was Chief Financial Officer of AusAm Biotechnologies, Inc., a biotechnology company developing diagnostics and therapeutics to identify and treat kidney, cardiovascular and infectious diseases. Ms. Barrington held several positions from 1997 to 2000 at British Telecom in both finance and marketing in New Business Development. She was one of the founders of a new business unit within BT and worked directly for a U.K. Board Member in the Strategy Team. Ms. Barrington has served as a consultant to Quentra Networks, Inc., Financial Analyst at Thorn EMI, a multimedia company, Financial Controller for Johnson & Higgins, a U.S. insurance broker, and Audit Senior for BDO Stoy Hayward, an international accountancy firm. She received a B.A. from Lancaster University, England and holds post-graduate degrees with theInstitute of Chartered Accountants of England & Wales and the Chartered Institute of Marketing (U.K.).
Johan Skog Ph.D.
Senior Researcher
Dr. Skog was appointed our Director of Exosome Research in August of 2008. Dr. Skog received his MSc from Umeå University in 1999 and his PhD specializing in gene therapy in 2005. He is an assistant in Neuroscience at Massachusetts General Hospital and Instructor at Harvard Medical School. He holds this appointment in conjuction with his appointment at Exosome Diagnostics. He is the primary inventor on the provisional patent ‘Use of membrane vesicles (exosomes) in diagnosis and prognosis of cancer’ that is owned by Massachusetts General Hospital.
Harvey J. Barnett
Director
Mr. Barnett is one of our founders and has been a Director since inception. He is currently of counsel to the law firm of Sperling and Slater, Chicago IL. Mr. Barnett's 40 years of practice has been devoted exclusively to litigation and trial work primarily in the field of complex commercial matters. Mr. Barnett has tried more than 150 cases in all courts and tribunals throughout the country, including jury trials, non-jury, equity courts, administrative tribunals and arbitrations. He has handled appeals in State and Federal Appellate Cfourts throughout the country, including the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Barnett currently serves as Chairman of the Board of the Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago and as a trustee of United Jewish Communities. He has been a long-time activist in the Soviet Jewry movement and serves on the Board of Chicago Action for Soviet Jewry and previously on the board of the Union of Councils for Soviet Jews; he has served on the board of the Anti-Defamation League and received its Abraham Marovitz Civil Rights award in 2004. He also has served as a member of his local school board in Highland Park, Illinois. Mr. Barnett is a graduate of the University of Illinois and Northwestern Law School.
Joseph Boystak
Director
Mr. Boystak joined our Board of Directors in May of 2008. Mr. Boystak serves as the CEO of Hudson/Brightwaters, a life-sciences merchant banking firm with offices in New York and Los Angeles. He is also the CEO of Brightwaters Capital, LLC, a private equity group focused in the health care and life sciences sectors. Mr. Boystak has 25 years of investment banking and principal investing experience and has been directly involved in over $15 billion of transactions in the health care industry. He served as Founding Managing Director – Global Life Sciences Group with Jefferies & Co. Prior to that he served as Managing Director & Head of Health Care Banking at Tucker Antony Sutro and Security Pacific Merchant Bank. He also served as a Vice President – Investment Banking at Dean Witter Reynolds. Mr. Boystak currently serves on Health Advisory Board at The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Cardioceutics, NanoPacific Holdings, and WaterStyle Holdings boards.
James Chambers
Director
Mr. Chambers joined our Board of Directors in April of 2008. From 1996 to 2000, he held several positions at Quest Diagnostics, the nation’s leading provider of diagnostic testing, information and services, most recently as President of Business Services. Mr. Chambers assisted with the integration of Quest Diagnostics and SmithKline Beecham Clinical Laboratories and the initiative to grow Quest Diagnostic’s anatomic pathology business. Prior to joining Quest Diagnostics, Mr. Chambers spent over 10 years at Corning Incorporated, in various positions including Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of the clinical laboratories business. Previously he held management jobs in finance and corporate development at Vista Chemical Company and Conoco, Inc. Mr. Chambers is currently a principal in Conundrum Capital Partners, LLC, a management advisory and investment firm. Mr. Chambers received his MIM from the American Graduate School of International Management, his MBA from Southern Methodist University, and undergraduate degrees from Dickinson College.
John Holaday
Director
Dr. Holaday is Chief Executive Officer of QRxPharma (ASX: QRX and OTCQX: QRXPY), a specialty pharmaceutical company specializing in pain and CNS diseases and headquartered in Sydney, Australia and Bedminster, New Jersey. A veteran life-science entrepreneur, Dr. Holaday has built five biopharmaceutical companies over the past 19 years, raising more than $400M in public and private financing. Dr. Holaday founded EntreMed, (ENMD, NASDAQ) in 1992 and served as its Chairman, President and CEO until his retirement in 2003 and was the co-founder, director, Scientific Director and SVP of Medicis Pharmaceutical Corporation (MRX, NYSE). Prior to joining the private sector, he was the founder and Chief of the Neuropharmacology Branch at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research for 21 years. He was a Professor of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine until 1996 and is currently a Professor of Psychiatry at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. He is a graduate of the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine with a PhD in neuropharmacology.
Scientific Advisory Board
Xandra Breakfield
Scientific Advisor to the Company
Dr. Breakfield is currently Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School and Geneticist in the Neurology and Radiology Services at Massachusetts General Hospital where she directs the Laboratory of Experimental Gene Therapy. Dr. Breakefield has served on the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee and is a member of an NIH Study Section that reviews translational research. She is currently serving on the Board of Directors of the American Society for Gene Therapy and the Scientific Advisory Board of the Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy, and is on the editorial board of six journals in related fields. She has been at the forefront of innovative research on gene therapy for brain tumors including novel killing mechanisms such as use of prodrug-activating enzymes delivered by oncolytic virus vectors and neuroprecursor cells as homing vehicles for delivery of therapeutic proteins. She has also led efforts in new methods of in vivo molecular imaging of gene delivery and tumor regression, and modulation of microRNAs in tumors and associated endothelial cells as a means to kill tumor stem cells and block angiogenesis. She and her colleagues are now actively involved in characterizing the role of exosomes produced by tumor cells in manipulation of normal tissue to promote tumor expansion and as serum biomarkers to monitor tumor status. She received her A.B. from Wilson College and her Ph.D. from Georgetown University, and did her postdoctoral training with the Nobel Prize winner, Dr. Marshall Nirenberg at NIH. She has won awards from the McKnight Foundation and Senator Jacob Javits program at NIH. She has published over 400 papers and is considered an international leader in the field of the genetics and gene therapy for brain tumors.
Dennis Brown
Scientific Advisory to the Company
Dr. Brown is currently Director of Massachusetts General Hospital Program in Membrane Biology and Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Brown also serves as Associate Chief for Research Affairs, Massachusetts General Hospital Nephrology Division and is Editor in Chief of the American Journal of Physiology - Cell Physiology. Brown received his Ph.D. in Biology in 1975 from the University of East Anglia in England, and performed postdoctoral studies with at the University of Geneva Medical School in Switzerland, where he developed his ongoing interest in protein and vesicle trafficking in epithelial cells. He is currently also on the Editorial Boards of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology and the Journal of Histochemistry and Cell Biology. He served on the Epithelial Subspeciality steering committee of the APS, and was the Carl Gottschalk Distinguished Lecturer of the Renal section at the Experimental Biology meeting in Washington in 2000. He was a member of the Veteran's Administration Renal Physiology study section, and of the American Heart Association (AHA) New England peer review committee. He has served as an ad-hoc member of several NIH review committees.
Lester M. Crawford, DVM, Ph.D.
Scientific Advisor to the Company
Lester M. Crawford, DVM, PhD. is a Scientific Advisor to the Company. Dr. Crawford served as Deputy Commissioner, Acting Commissioner and Commissioner at the Food & Drug Administration between 2002 and 2005. This was his fourth stint at FDA going back to 1975. He also served as Administrator of the Food Safety & Inspection Service at the US Department of Agriculture (1987-1991). In the academic world, Crawford served for 13 years in various capacities at the University of Georgia including Chairman of the Department of Physiology & Pharmacology. At Georgetown University, he was Director of the Center for Food & Nutrition Policy from 1997-2001. And he held positions of authority at the National Food Processors Association and the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges in the 1990s. Crawford is a Member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and he is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine in the UK. He is also a Fellow of the International Society of Food Science & Technology. He received the Award of Merit from the FDA in 1983 and the Presidential Rank Award from President Reagan in 1988 while he was at USDA. Additionally, Crawford is a Member of the Expert Advisory Panel on Food Safety of the World Health Organization. Lester Crawford is the author of over a hundred scientific publications and is the co-author of four books. His veterinary degree is from Auburn University (1963), his honorary doctorate is from Budapest University (1987) and he holds the PhD in pharmacology from the University of Georgia (1969).
Richard L. Edelson
Scientific Advisor to the Company
Dr. Edelson began his tenure as Director of Yale Cancer Center on July 1, 2003. Dr. Edelson has been a Professor on the Yale University School of Medicine faculty since 1986 with a continued special interest in the treatment and fundamental investigation of T cell lymphomas. Prior to joining Yale, Dr. Edelson served as the Head of the Immunobiology Group in Columbia University's Comprehensive Cancer Center and as Associate Director of that institution's General Clinical Research Center. Dr. Edelson has served the Medical Center in several leadership capacities. In addition to having been Deputy Dean for Clinical Affairs from 2000-2003, he has also served as Director of the Cancer Center's Lymphoma Research Program, participated as a member of both the Yale-New Haven Hospital Board of Trustees and the Yale Medical Group Board of Governors, and has chaired several search committees within the Medical Center. Dr. Edelson received his Bachelor of Science degree from Hamilton College in New York and was awarded his MD degree from the Yale University School of Medicine. He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians, Dr. Edelson has published over 140 original scientific papers, authored or co-authored over 70 review articles and book chapters and 5 books, and holds 20 scientific and therapeutic patents.
Roger Henriksson
Scientific Advisor to the Company
Dr. Henriksson is head of the Dept of Radiation Sciences, and chief physician of the Section of Neuro-Oncology, Lung Carcinoma and Malignant Melanoma at University Hospital, Umeå, Sweden where he also serves as a professor in Experimental Oncology and chief physician in Medical Oncology and Radiotherapy. In addition, Dr. Henriksson serves as a senior medical advisor to AstraZenica, chairman of the North Sweden Cancer Society, chairman of the National Group for Treatment of CNS Tumors and as a board member of the National Group for Treatment of Lung Cancer in Sweden. Dr. Henriksson has served as director of clinical studies, Department of Oncology, and head of the Experimental Research Unit in the Department of Oncology at University Hospital, Umeå. He is former member of the scientific advisory board for the Swedish Cancer Society. Dr. Henriksson has authored 274 publications in peer review journals, including publications in all phases of drug development.