As interim CEO and one of three SpheroFill co-founders, Dr Paul Weinberger is a nationally recognized airway reconstruction surgeon, scientist, and healthcare leader. In addition to his leadership role at SpheroFill, he is the Medical Director of Specialty Physicians at Deaconess Clinic in Evansville, Indiana. His undergraduate training was at Georgia State and Emory University, followed by medical school at the Medical College of Georgia and subsequent residency and fellowship training programs at Georgia Health Sciences University, Yale University, and the Royal National Throat Nose and Ear Hospital and University College of London. His peer-reviewed scientific publications have been cited in more than 10,000 unique journal articles, and he is named inventor of 6 awarded patents. He has received numerous national awards, including the Fanconi Award from the American Head and Neck Society, the Farr Award from Yale School of Medicine, and the National Leadership Award from the American Medical Association.

David Westberg, CEO at Nanexa since 2015, has many years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry, including roles at Pharmacia, Pharmacia-UpJohn and Orexo. He has worked as a global project manager for development projects and was Head of Product Development (Pharmaceutical and Analytical Development) at Pharmacia amongst many other roles. Mr Westberg was also the main project manager who was responsible for taking two major Orexo products (Edluar and Zubsolv) from the early development phase through formulation development and clinical studies and onto registration and market approval with the FDA in the US.

Dr Ashley Williams is the Director of Research and Development. He has over 15 years of experience studying the molecular biology and genetics of Escherichia coli. His research has spanned a spectrum of diverse fields that recent research has revealed are remarkably intertwined, including DNA damage and repair, cell cycle control, host-pathogen interactions, immune DNA sensing, and systemic inflammatory responses. Before joining SiVEC Biotechnologies, Dr Williams studied aging and aging-related diseases at the CECAD Research Center at the University of Cologne in Cologne, Germany. Dr Williams received his Bachelor of Science and PhD in Microbiology from Indiana University and completed post-doctoral fellowships at Harvard University and the University of Southern California.

TBA

Dr Tal Zaks is a Venture Partner with OrbiMed. Dr Zaks was recently the Chief Medical Officer at Moderna, where he led the development of the company’s COVID-19 vaccine and other key programs. Previously, Dr Zaks held senior leadership positions in drug development at major pharmaceutical companies, including Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline. Dr Zaks received his MD and PhD from the Ben Gurion University and conducted post-doctoral research at the US National Institutes of Health.

Haiming Wu is the Head of New Device Technology Research and Innovation at Sanofi responsible for early-stage device technology development and innovation to meet emerging medical device needs of Sanofi portfolio. He started his career in the technology sector with HP and Texas Instruments and has since transitioned to medical device design and technology development. Over the years, he has developed expertise on a variety of drug delivery devices working at Baxter, BD and Biogen before joining Sanofi, and produced over 20 patents many of which have turned into commercial products. Direct CNS drug delivery to by-pass blood-brain barrier has been a major focus of his research and development efforts to enable and optimize delivery of new therapeutic modalities such as Antisense Oligonucleotides and Gene Therapies for neurological disorders. Other targeted drug delivery and IV infusion innovation are also major areas of his recent focus. He holds an MS degree from Boston University and an MBA from Babson College.

Dr Brandon Wustman is a seasoned R&D executive with experience throughout his nearly 20-year career across many phases of R&D including discovery, clinical development, and the launch of new therapeutic platforms.

Prior to joining ReCode Therapeutics (and its predecessor, TranscripTx) in 2015, he had positions of increasing responsibility, including senior director, Preclinical Biology, at Amicus Therapeutics from 2002 to 2014. At Amicus, Dr Wustman established a new lab focused on protein therapeutic discovery and production. He was also instrumental in leading the discovery and preclinical development of pharmacological chaperones used alone and in combination with enzyme replacement therapies for seven different preclinical programs. Dr Wustman received his BS and PhD from Michigan Technological University. He was an Alexandar Humboldt Fellow at the University of Cologne, Germany and a postdoctoral fellow at New York University from 2000 to 2002. Dr Wustman has published more than 20 peer-reviewed scientific articles and is also the inventor on nine issued US patents.

Yuhong Zeng received her PhD in Analytical Chemistry in 2006 from the University of Kansas (KU). She then had her postdoctoral training followed by holding a Research Associate position at the Macromolecule and Vaccine Stabilization Center at KU. In 2011, she joined the formulation group at Alcon/Novartis and worked on both early- and late-stage antibody drug product development for ophthalmic use. Between 2016-2018, she worked at Vaxess Technologies and led formulation efforts in development of microneedle patches for vaccine delivery. In 2018, she joined ReForm Biologics, now Comera Life Sciences, working on technologies and pipeline development that transform essential biopharmaceutics from IV to SQ delivery.

Prior to joining Hopewell Therapeutics as Chief Scientific Officer in 2022, Dr Kate Zhang served as VP of Biological Development at Editas Medicine, where she led the cross functional teams employing breakthrough CRISPR-based in vivo and ex vivo gene editing technology, bringing AAV gene therapy in ophthalmology and autologous cell therapies in hematology from program inception to three successful IND submissions.

Previously, Dr Zhang was the Senior Director of Global R&D Platforms and Global Pharmaceutical Development at Genzyme and Sanofi. As the portfolio head of global translational science, she was responsible for rare genetic diseases and contributed to the approval and commercialization of Cerezyme, Fabrazyme, Myozyme/Lumizyme, Thyrogen, Cerdelga, Lemtrada and Zenpozyme.

Dr Zhang began her career as a postdoctoral fellow at the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute at NIH. She has co-authored more than 70 peer-reviewed scientific articles and co-invented multiple issued U.S. patents. She received her BS from Tsinghua University, China, her MSc from the Chinese Academy of Science and her PhD from Queen’s University, Canada.

With formal training in polymers, Dr Ke Zhang is devoting his career to facilitating the marriage of synthetic polymers and nucleic acids. His prized inventions include several forms of DNA-polymer amphiphiles, conjugates, and nanoparticles, which are being geared towards materials science and cancer treatment. Dr Zhang is currently a Professor of Chemistry at Northeastern University and a recent entrepreneur overseeing the commercialization of his technology through pacDNA LLC, where he is the interim CEO. Prior to his current position, Dr Zhang was a postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern University and a doctoral student at Washington University in St Louis.

Khalil Barrage (BA ‘87) is a Managing Director at The Invus Group, LLC and Chief Investment Officer of Invus Public Equities. He is based in New York, where he leads the biotech public equity investment strategy, co-leads public/private investing team, and manages global teams of investment professionals across offices in New York, Paris and Hong Kong. Mr Barrage joined Invus in 2003 to build a public equity investing strategy to complement the firm’s history in private equity. Assets Under management in the biotech sector stand over $3 billion and over the past two decades, He and his team have established Invus as an investment partner-of-choice for public and private companies, with a particular record of backing emerging and innovative biotechnology companies. Prior to Invus, Mr Barrage started his investment carer at The Olayan Group, a multinational, multibillion dollar investment enterprise with origins in Saudi Arabia. He joined Olayan in 1988, rising through the ranks to manage the firm’s U.S. portfolio of equity investments. He is a frequent speaker on biotechnology and investment panels and is the co-founder of Biosciences Lebanese International Network (Biolink.org), a global networking platform for life science professionals of Lebanese descent. He serves as interim Chair of the board of Sensorion, and is a member of the boards of ElevateBio, Valerio Therapeutics, Orthobond and Protagenic Therapeutics. As part of his philanthropic engagement, Mr Barrage serves on the boards of the Children of Armenia Fund, LIFE Gen Lebanon and Solving Kids’ Cancer. He earned a BA in Economics from American University of Beirut in 1987.