Vaccine Expert George Siber Joins Genocea Biosciences as Executive Chairman.Former Wyeth Vaccines EVP and Chief Scientific Officer brings industry and academic experience to cutting edge vaccine company CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Genocea Biosciences, a vaccine discovery and development company, today announced that it had hired George R. Siber, M.D. as Executive Chairman. "Dr. Siber brings a tremendous depth of knowledge to the company," said Genocea President Robert Paull. "His vaccine experience will be instrumental in helping make our breakthrough development platform a commercial reality." Dr. Siber is widely regarded as one of the leading global authorities in vaccines and was previously the Executive Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer of Wyeth Vaccines. While at Wyeth, Dr. Siber oversaw the development and approval of multiple widely-used childhood vaccines including an acellular pertussis vaccine acellular pertussis vaccine n. Abbr. DTaP A diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis vaccine containing two or more antigens but no whole cells. (Acel-Imune), a meningococcal meningitis vaccine (Meningitec), and a pneumococcal vaccine (Prevnar). Prior to joining Wyeth, Dr. Siber was Director of the Massachusetts Public Health Biologic Laboratories and Harvard Medical School Harvard Medical School (HMS) is one of the graduate schools of Harvard University. It is a prestigious American medical school located in the Longwood Medical Area of the Mission Hill neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. Associate Professor of Medicine at Dana Farber Cancer Institute. During this time, Dr. Siber oversaw research and manufacturing of multiple vaccines and immune globulins including Respigam, a human immune globulin human immune globulin A therapeutic prepared from a donor pool screened and negative for HIV-1 Indications for use Primary immunodeficiencies–eg, X-linked agammaglobulinemia, SCID and combined variable immune deficiency, and in acute or chronic ITP. See Immunoglobulin. against RSV RSV respiratory syncytial virus; Rous sarcoma virus. RSV abbr. respiratory syncytial virus RSV 1 Respiratory syncytial virus, see there 2 Rous sarcoma virus, see there , which was the precursor of Synagis. In recognition of his contributions to this field, the recently completed $100 million Massachusetts Biologic Laboratory building for vaccine development and manufacturing was dedicated to Dr. Siber and his colleague Dr. Jeanne Leszczynski. Dr. Siber has authored more than 150 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals and holds three issued patents. He has also served on numerous U.S. government and international advisory committees including the WHO/UNDP Steering Committee for Bacterial Vaccines, the Steering Committee for Development of Pneumococcal Vaccine for the Pan American Health Organization The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) is an international public health agency with 100 years of experience in working to improve health and living standards of the countries of the Americas. It serves as the specialized organization for health of the Inter-American System. , the Institute of Medicine Committee on the Children's Vaccine Initiative and the NIH "Not invented here." See digispeak. NIH - The United States National Institutes of Health. Blue Ribbon Panel for Bioterrorism and its Implications for Biomedical Research. He served as Chairman of the Scientific Review Committee of the U.S. Army's HIV HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), either of two closely related retroviruses that invade T-helper lymphocytes and are responsible for AIDS. There are two types of HIV: HIV-1 and HIV-2. HIV-1 is responsible for the vast majority of AIDS in the United States. research program in 2002 and 2006, serves on the Board of Scientific Counselors for the National Vaccine Center of the NIH, and the Advisory Board of the Massachusetts Biologic Laboratories, University of Massachusetts Medical School UMMS is ranked fourth in primary care education among the nation’s 125 medical schools in the 2006 U.S.News & World Report annual guide, “America’s Best Graduate Schools”. UMMS is also a major center for research. . Dr. Siber brings his vast experience in vaccines to Genocea, which was formed in 2006 from technology developed at University of California at Berkeley (body, education) University of California at Berkeley - (UCB) See also Berzerkley, BSD. http://berkeley.edu/. Note to British and Commonwealth readers: that's /berk'lee/, not /bark'lee/ as in British Received Pronunciation. by Dr. Darren Higgins. Dr. Higgins, currently Associate Professor of Microbiology and Molecular Genetics at Harvard Medical School co-founded Genocea with Associate Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School, Dr. David Sinclair and with leading venture capital firms Name Location Founding date Managing Partners/Directors Specialty Capital managed 5AM Ventures Menlo Park, CA; Waltham, MA 2002 John Diekman, PhD (managing partner), Scott Rocklage, PhD (managing partner), Andrew Schwab (managing partner) life sciences $200M [1] Lux Capital Management of New York and Polaris Venture Partners of Boston. Genocea is focused on identifying antigens for the next generation of novel vaccines. "Genocea's platform represents a powerful new technology to rapidly identify key CD4+ and CD8+ T-cell antigens in complex microorganisms or mammalian cells," said Siber. "The technology has the potential to discriminate protective from non-protective antigens and can enable rational rather than empiric selection, thereby dramatically accelerating the vaccine development process." Dr. Siber will oversee Genocea's world-class Scientific Advisory Board, which includes Penny J. Hitchcock, D.V.M., Former Chief of Sexually Transmitted Diseases Sexually transmitted diseases Infections that are acquired and transmitted by sexual contact. Although virtually any infection may be transmitted during intimate contact, the term sexually transmitted disease is restricted to conditions that are largely , National Institutes of Health; Ian Gust, Professorial Fellow, Department of Microbiology & Immunology, University of Melbourne
In 2006, Times Higher Education Supplement ranked the University of Melbourne 22nd in the world. Because of the drop in ranking, University of Melbourne is currently behind four Asian universities - Beijing University, ; Peter Hutt, LL.M., Former Chief Legal Counsel, Food & Drug Administration; and Una S. Ryan, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer, AVANT Immunotherapeutics. "Genocea's high-throughput screening system removes the guesswork associated with designing vaccines to stimulate T-cell immunity," said co-founder Higgins. "Dr. Siber's scientific leadership and accomplishments in the vaccine industry will be a driving force in realizing the full potential of Genocea's technology." About Genocea Biosciences: Genocea Biosciences was founded in 2006 to commercialize key breakthroughs in vaccine discovery and development. Genocea can rapidly identify antigens that result in the in vivo stimulation of protective CD8+ and CD4+ T cells, targets that can be immediately incorporated into existing antigen delivery systems to produce multivalent vaccine formulations that have the highest probability of generating protective cell-mediated immunity. Investors include Lux Capital Management and Polaris Venture Partners. Visit www.genocea.com for more information. |
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