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May/June 2018 Laboratory Focus www.laboratoryfocus.ca
Appointments
MYM Nutraceuticals Inc. announces that Dr. Charith Adkar has joined MYM as its new chief science officer (CFO). Charith completed his PhD in Plant Biol-
industries, including pharmaceuticals, life sciences and healthcare. Millette is a lawyer, holds a bachelor of commerce and a law degree from the University of Montreal, and holds the designations of Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CA) and Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA). CIHR appoints Dr. Christopher McMaster as the new scientific director of CIHR’s Institute of Genetics. This appointment will be effective July 1, 2018. McMaster is a professor and head of the Department of Pharmacology at
Dr. Charith Adkar ogy and Crop Production from the University of Milano, Italy with the specialization in molecular plant pathology. He completed his postdoctoral studies at Hirosaki University, Japan and Université de Sherbrooke, Canada. His areas of expertise include Plant Science, Biotechnology, Microbiology, Molecular host-pathogen interactions and Bioinformatics. He will manage MYM’s scientific, research and technological operations, and will work primarily at the Laval and Weedon production facilities. ExCellThera Inc. announces the appointment of David Millette as chief financial and legal officer. Millette combines a solid background in finance and law, having practised
David Millette in the areas of accounting, finance and management consulting with a leading firm of chartered professional accountants for several years, and in the areas of corporate and securities law, financings and business acquisitions and sales for over a decade, including several years as a partner, with a top tier international law firm. He has a broad range of financial, legal and strategic experience across several
Dr. Christopher McMaster
Dalhousie University, and director of the Cheminformatics Drug Discovery Lab, which uses sophisticated software to design new drugs. He is also the co-founder and CEO of DeNovaMed, a biotechnology company that uses computer-aided design to drive the development of new classes of antimicrobials to address the global health threat of antimicrobial resistance. As Scientific Director, McMaster will work with his community to identify research priorities, develop funding opportunities, build partnerships, and translate research evidence into policy and practice to improve the health of Canadians and people around the world. As a member of CIHR’s leadership team, he will participate in setting and implementing CIHR’s strategic direction. The Centre for Drug Research and Development, Canada’s national drug development and commercialization centre, announces the appointment of Dr. Lana Janes as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence. As a life sciences industry executive for over 20 years, Janes has extensive pharmaceutical development experience that spans the full life cycle of therapeutic product development from discovery through commercialization. As an Entrepreneur-inResidence, she will work with CDRD
Dr. Lana Janes leadership to identify specific areas of strategic commercial opportunity, and then in partnership with other stakeholders, drive the building of a new company of scale that can develop those opportunities, and grow into a strong new anchor for Canada’s life science sector. Her previous positions include senior vice president, intellectual property and technology development and chief patent officer, with leadership and oversight responsibilities for all R&D aspects of Novelion Therapeutics’ late-stage ophthalmology orphan assets. Janes received her AB in Chemistry with Honours from Harvard University and her PhD in organic chemistry with Honours from McGill University, where she also conducted post-doctoral work in the field of biological organic chemistry. She is also registered to practice as a patent agent in both Canada and the US, is an author of numerous scientific publications in the field of organic and medical chemistry. Aptose Biosciences Inc. appoints Caroline M. Loewy to the Board of Directors. Aptose’s Board of Directors now includes seven members with extensive experience across diverse disciplines in biotechnology and pharmaceutical development. Loewy is an accomplished executive leader with more than 25 years of experience in accelerating biotechnology product development and growth. She currently provides strategic advisory services to life science companies on a variety
Caroline M. Loewy
of high-impact matters including funding strategies, product pipeline evaluation, and assessing business development opportunities. She has held numerous executive roles; most recently, she co-founded and served as chief financial officer and chief business officer of Achieve Life Sciences, Inc. Prior to that, she held the position of chief financial officer of both public and private biopharmaceutical companies including Tobira Therapeutics, Inc., Corcept Therapeutics Incorporated, and Poniard Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Loewy also spent 11 years as a senior biotechnology equity research analyst at Morgan Stanley and Prudential Securities. She sits on the board of directors of CymaBay Therapeutics Inc.; is a founding board member of the Global Genes Project, one of the leading rare disease patient advocacy organizations in the world; and is a member of the National Advisory Council of the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen) Center for Rare Childhood Disorders. She is also a founding board member of the KCNQ2 Cure Alliance Foundation and holds a BA degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA/MS degree from Carnegie Mellon University. InMed Pharmaceuticals Inc. announces the addition of Dr. Vikramaditya G. Yadav to its Scientific Advisory Board. Yadav is an assistant professor in the Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering at the University of British Columbia (UBC), and currently serves as the Chair of the Biotechnology Division of the Chemical Institute of Canada. He has been recognized by Medicine Maker journal as one of the 100 most influential people in drug development and manufacturing. Yadav received his doctoral degree in chemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His graduate work focused on enzyme and microbial metabolic engineering for the synthesis of pharmaceuticals. He later conducted post-doctoral research on biophysics and biological thermodynamics at Harvard University. He joined UBC, Canada’s pre-eminent center for biotechnology research, in the summer of 2014 and has since established a world-leading, industry- connected research group that works on wide-ranging topics such as metagenomics, plant chemistry, tissue engineering, drug discovery and pharmaceutical manufacturing. Yadav received his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the University of Waterloo.
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