Chimerix

Scientific Advisory Board

Michael T. Crimmins, Ph.D.

Mary Ann Smith Distinguished Professor of Chemistry and Senior Associate Dean for the Natural Sciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Michael Crimmins is the Senior Associate Dean for Natural Sciences and a professor of chemistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with research interests in the development of new synthetic methods and their application to the total synthesis of biologically active compounds.  A variety of new synthetic methods have been developed in his laboratories as well as the completion of the total synthesis of a wide variety of structural types of natural products and the synthesis of a series of marine natural products.  He is currently a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Organic Chemistry.  Born in East St. Louis, Illinois, Dr. Crimmins received his B.A. degree from Hendrix College (1960) and his Ph.D. from Duke (1980), where he worked on synthetic applications of intermolecular photochemical cycloadditions under the direction of Professor Steven W. Baldwin.  He was a postdoctoral associate at the California Institute of Technology working with Professor David A. Evans from 1980-81.  He joined the faculty at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1981 as an assistant professor of chemistry.  He was subsequently promoted to associate professor (1988) and professor (1993).  In 2001, he was named George and Alice Welsh Distinguished Term Professor and assumed the position of Mary Ann Smith Distinguished Professor in January 2003.  Dr. Crimmins served as chair of the Department of Chemistry from 2007 -2009 and is currently Senior Associate Dean for the Natural Sciences in the College of Arts and Sciences at UNC-CH.

Earl R. Kern, Ph.D.

Emeritus Professor of Pediatrics, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Earl Kern is professor emeritus in the department of pediatrics, division of clinical virology, and also holds a position as senior scientist at the University of Alabama Comprehensive Cancer Center and the Center for AIDS Research.  He holds secondary appointments in the department of comparative medicine and the department of microbiology.  Dr. Kern’s areas of interest span chemotherapy and pathogenesis of viral infections in animal models, preclinical evaluation of antiviral drugs, interferon and interferon inducers, immuno-therapy and nonspecific resistance to viral infections, neuro-virulence and latency of herpesvirus strains, herpesviruses as opportunistic infections in immunocompromised hosts, virulence of drug resistant mutants, antiviral screening against herpesviruses and drug development for poxvirus infections.  Dr. Kern received his B.S. degree from the University of Utah in Microbiology followed by his M.S. and Ph.D. in Microbiology from the University of Utah.  Dr. Kern serves on the scientific advisory board of several organizations of the pharmaceutical industry in the areas of virology and antiviral research.

Dennis Liotta, Ph.D.

Professor of Chemistry, Emory University

Dennis Liotta is a Samuel Candler Dobbs professor of chemistry at Emory University and has been a professor at Emory University for twenty-seven years.  He is a fellow of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the recipient of a Camille and Henry Dreyfus Teacher Scholar Fellowship and won an Alexander von Humboldt Senior Scientist Award.  While at Emory, he has authored more than two hundred research publications and patents.  Over the last thirteen years he has also developed a great deal of experience in the discovery and development of pharmaceuticals.  Dr. Liotta has served as a consultant to several major pharmaceutical firms, including Merck, Glaxo, Burroughs Wellcome, Boehringer Ingelheim and Johnson & Johnson.  In addition, he serves (or has served) on the Scientific Advisory Boards of several prominent biotech start-ups, including Triangle Pharmaceuticals (SAB Chair), AtheroGenics, Pharmasset (scientific founder), iThemba Pharmaceuticals (scientific founder), Slainte Bioceuticals and FOB Synthesis.  In addition, he is the inventor of record for several clinically important antivirals, including FTC (Emtriva, Emtricitabine), D-D4FC (DPC 817, Reverset), Racivir and Elvucitabine.  Professor Liotta received his Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry in 1974 from The City University of New York and completed his post-doctoral training at The Ohio State University.

 

Douglas D. Richman, M.D.

Distinguished Professor of Pathology and Medicine, University of California, San Diego

Douglas Richman is a Distinguished Professor of Pathology and Medicine at the University of California in San Diego where he is Director of the AIDS Research Institute and the Center for AIDS Research.  He is the Florence Seeley Riford Chair in AIDS Research  Dr. Richman has made major clinical and laboratory contributions to the field of HIV/AIDS, which represent a model of translational medical research.  He helped design and conduct the clinical evaluation of new drugs and treatment strategies, including the first trial of combination antiretroviral therapy and the initial study documenting the value of the strategy of rendering HIV RNA undetectable.  Two areas of his laboratory investigations represent landmark studies in HIV research.  His laboratory first identified HIV drug resistance.  This was the scientific foundation for the development of combination antiretroviral therapies.  Subsequent studies documented the impact of drug resistance on treatment failure, the presence of mixtures of different viral phenotypes and genotypes circulating in the same patient, the pre-existence of drug-resistant mutants in untreated patients, the impact of disease stage and viral replication on the rates of viral evolution, and the independent evolution of different populations of HIV in lymphoid tissues and the brain.  These studies have had a broad impact on the development, evaluation and regulatory approval of drugs, and helped to establish the importance of drug resistance assays in the day-to-day management of infected patients.  His laboratory also documented the existence of reservoirs of latently infected CD4 cells in patients who appeared to be "fully suppressed" on potent antiretroviral therapy. These observations have raised fundamental questions about T lymphocyte biology and viral replication that bridge to a basic understanding of viral pathogenesis.  More recently, his laboratory elucidated the remarkable evolution of neutralizing antibody responses in HIV infection, providing important insights for the development of an effective HIV vaccine.  He plays an authoritative and constructive role as a speaker on both basic and clinical subjects, a lead editor of the major textbook on clinical virology, organizer of major international meetings and chair of national and international committees.

Richard J. Whitley, M.D.

Professor of Pediatrics, Microbiology & Medicine, University of Alabama at Birmingham

Richard Whitley is professor of pediatrics, microbiology, medicine and neurosurgery and the Loeb Eminent Scholar chair in Pediatrics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.  He is a scientist at the Cancer Research and Training Center, an associate director of the Center for AIDS research, vice chairman of the Department of Pediatrics and division director of Pediatric Infectious Diseases.  Additionally, Dr. Whitley has been recognized both nationally and internationally.  He is President of the Infectious Diseases Society of America and Chair of the Board of Scientific Councilors for the Centers for Infectious Diseases, CDC.  Dr. Whitley is also an elected member of the Society for Pediatric Research, the American Pediatric Society, the American Society for Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians.  He has been elected to Council of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases is President as well as to Council for the International Infectious Diseases Society.  He is on the board of directors of the International Society for Antiviral Research and was the first president of the International Society for Antiviral Research.  He has held numerous positions at the National Institutes of Health, including serving on virology study section, chairing the NIAID AIDS data safety and monitoring board and the OAR executive committee.  He has received unrestricted research grants from Bristol-Myers Squibb and Glaxo Wellcome.  Dr. Whitley has traced the development of therapeutics, defined the natural history and established diagnostic approaches to HSV encephalitis and neonatal HSV infection individually as well as through the NIAID Collaborative Antiviral Study Group of which he is the principal investigator.

Seth Rudnick, MD, Director

General Partner, Canaan Partners

Seth Rudnick joined the Chimerix Board in 2007 and served as co-chairman from June 2009 to April 2010. Dr. Rudnick joined Canaan in 1998 as a Venture Partner focusing on healthcare investments. He became a General Partner in 2000. His background in the healthcare industry includes comprehensive experience in research, development, clinical trials analysis and biotechnology, as well as founding and growing start-up companies in the industry.

Dr. Rudnick currently serves as chairman of the board for Liquidia Technologies and ORTHOCON, and sits on the boards of Sopherion, Spine Wave, and VaxInnate.

Prior to joining Canaan, Dr. Rudnick served as CEO and Chairman at CytoTherapeutics (CTII). Before that, he helped start and served as head of R&D for Ortho Biotech, a division of Johnson & Johnson. In that role, he led the development efforts for a portfolio of projects which are still responsible for significant Johnson & Johnson revenues.  He began his industrial career at Schering-Plough, where he ran clinical trials for the alpha interferon project, and later transferred to Biogen to run that company's pharmaceutical development efforts.

His academic career began when he served on the medical and public health faculty at Chapel Hill. Dr. Rudnick is a Clinical Professor of Medicine at Chapel Hill where he teaches and advises the faculty on biotechnology issues.

In 2006, Seth was included on the Midas List, a prominent venture capital listing which ranks the best dealmakers in high-tech and life sciences.