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Don Staunton, PhD : Founder and CSO.
Don Staunton, PhD : Founder and CSO.
Dr. Staunton has over 25 years of biotech experience, He previously served as Co-founder and CSO of Arbele Corporation, Founder of CisThera and as Scientific Fellow at ICOS Corporation. At Arbele he created a bispecific immunotherapeutic to treat colon cancer that is in phase 1 clinical trials. He designed potent stable and transient (RNA based) CAR T and NK cell therapeutics. His group at ICOS Corporation was first to discover and publish a small molecule inhibitor of PI3 Kinase delta which was developed and FDA approved as a therapy for the treatment of B-cell malignancies. His group identified a small molecule antagonist of the integrin LFA-1 that entered clinical trials for psoriasis. Dr. Staunton has been on joint research boards for several collaborative drug development projects including that with Abbott Laboratories and Array Biopharmaceutical. He has also been involved in initiating CRO agreements and in licensing technology.
At Synergy IMT and Arbele Corp. Dr. Staunton conceived several discovery platforms for the generation of novel multi-specific - multifunctional immunotherapeutics, including antibodies, CAR cells and CAR cell-related immunotherapeutics. He has filed over a dozen patents and has over 60 publications with over 14,400 citations.
Prior to industry, he was an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School. He conducted pioneering research in leukocyte adhesion molecules including the cloning and characterization of ICAM-1 and ICAM2. He was first to determine the molecular contact between ICAM-1 and CD18 integrins, human rhinovirus and P. falciparum infected RBCs. He cloned and characterized other immune cell molecules including CD48.
John Harlan, MD : CMO
John Harlan, MD : CMO
John Harlan, MD is a Professor Emeritus of Medicine at the University of Washington (UW). He served as Head of the Division of Hematology at UW and as Chief of Hematology-Oncology and Associate Medical Director at Harborview Medical Center, a UW Medicine hospital. He is board-certified in Internal Medicine, Hematology, and Medical Oncology. While at UW Medicine he received multiple awards, including two endowed professorships, the Distinguished Patient Care Award, and the Dean’s Service Excellence Award. He has been selected as “Best Doctors in America”, “Seattle’s Best Doctors”, and “Top Seattle Doctors”.
Dr. Harlan has over 275 publications, which have been cited over 38,000 times. In 2002 he was designated as a ‘Highly Cited’ author in the field of Immunology, ranking in the top 0.5 percentile of publishing researchers. He conducted pioneering research in leukocyte and endothelial adhesion molecules, endothelial cell biology, apoptosis, and inflammation. His laboratory was the first to identify: neutrophil beta-2 integrin as an adhesion receptor for endothelial cells, lymphocyte and monocyte VLA-4 integrin as the adhesion receptor for endothelial VCAM-1, the induction of endothelial adhesion molecules by tumor necrosis factor, inhibition of ischemia-reperfusion injury in various organs by blockade of adhesion molecules, and the cytoprotective protective role of extracellular BCL-2 protein. He has given over 150 invited presentations at national and international meetings. He received Clinician Scientist and Established Investigator Awards from the American Heart Association and was elected to the prestigious American Society for Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians.
He has been a member of multiple editorial boards and has served on the Scientific Advisory Boards of Cytel Corp. (San Diego), Zymogenetics (Seattle), Molecumetics (Bellevue, WA), and Cryptome Pharmaceuticals (Melbourne) and he has been consultant to Biogen, Lexicon Genetics, and ICOS.
Ama Sikorski, PhD : Director
Dr Sikorski has over 20 years of experience as a Biotech Scientist. Her expertise encompasses the development of diverse immunotherapeutics including bi- and tri-specific antibodies, and CAR cells.
Dr Sikorski has played an integral role in generating successful patent and SBIR applications.
Prior to industry Dr Sikorski generated cre lox mice at the University of Washington to identify the role of the RIIβ subunit of PKA in energy homeostasis. She received her PhD in Immunology at Tufts University, and her bachelors degree in Biochemistry from Wellesley College.
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