SENS 2014 Conference Program Guide

August 21-23, 2014 Santa Clara, California
a SENS Research Foundation Conference
Program Guide

2
Dear Colleagues,
a SENS Research Foundation Conference
August 21-23, 2014
Hyatt Regency Hotel
Santa Clara, California
It is our pleasure to welcome you to the 2014 Rejuvenation Biotechnology Conference.
The continuing growth of research into the underlying causes of the diseases of aging
brings with it the opportunity to build a Rejuvenation Biotechnology industry, an
industry which builds on the strengths of regenerative medicine. Together over the next
three days, we believe we can help create this new industry and inspire each other – as
clinicians, researchers, patient advocates, regulators, venture capitalists, investors and
industry leaders – to work together to make this happen.
This conference has been designed to offer something for everyone: from the
inspirational words of our scientific, business, and venture capital speakers to the latest
research on diseases, such as Alzheimer’s Disease, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and
diabetes. An entire track of sessions will cover the regulatory, financial, and economic
issues involved in building a Rejuvenation Biotechnology industry. We have also
scheduled plenty of time for networking with each other during our meal breaks, Poster
sessions and our evening entertainment.
We would like to thank each of your for attending the Rejuvenation Biotechnology
Conference and bringing your expertise to our gathering. You have the vision, the
knowledge, the wherewithal and the experience to come together to pave the way
into the future. Throughout this conference, we ask you to stay engaged, deepen your
understanding of the field, build communities of interest and create collaborations that
will help shape the future of the industry.
Thank you for choosing this conference. Enjoy your time here, and once again welcome to
the Rejuvenation Biotechnology Conference.
Mike Kope
CEO, SENS Research Foundation
Aubrey de Grey
CSO, SENS Research Foundation

TO PARKING STRUCTURE
Welcome Letter. 2
Conference Schedule . 4
Speaker Biographies. 14
Sponsors . 26
Poster Abstracts . 33
NAPA I NAPA II NAPA III
SONOMA
MENDOCINO
SANTA CLARA
CONVENTION
CENTER
TUSCA
COURTYARD
TUSCA RESTAURANT
POOL ELEVATOR
CABANAS
WHIRLPOOL
SWIMMING POOL
@ THE MARKET
TERRA COURTYARD
Networking Meals, Posters and
Exhibits in Ballrooms EFGH
EVOLUTION
CAFE AND BAR
FRONT
DESK
ELEVATORS
CONCIERGE
UP TO BALLROOM
HOTEL ENTRANCE
GIFT SHOP
ATM
REGENCY CLUB®
MAGNOLIA
NETWORK
MEETING
CENTER
RESTROOMS
TRUYA SUSHI
LOUNGE
RESTROOMS
RESTROOMS
Keynotes, Plenary & Concurrent Panels,
and Performances in Ballrooms ABCD
Registration in LOBBY WEST
Ballrooms
LOBBY
WEST
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B
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Table of Contents

Conference Schedule
Registration (until 5:00 pm) - [LOBBY WEST]
Networking Breakfast - [Ballrooms EFGH]
Opening Remarks - Michael Kope, CEO , SENS Research Foundation - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Keynote: George Church, Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Professor of Health
Sciences and Technology, Harvard and MIT: New Epigenome Analysis and Engineering
Technologies for Reversal of Aging - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Molecular and Cellular Damage as the Cause of the Diseases of Aging Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will discuss the idea that the diseases of aging may stem from molecular and cellular
damage that accrues with age. Topics of discussion will include the types of damage that may
be involved, examples of how this applies to one or more diseases, and thoughts on how basic
research and industry could use this concept to drive therapeutic target identification and drug
treatment/development.
• Richard Barker, Director, Center for the Advancement of Sustainable Medical Innovation:
(Moderator)
• Aubrey de Grey, Co-Founder and Chief Science Officer, SENS Research Foundation
• Caleb Finch, ARCO/Kieschnick Professor of Gerontology and Biological Science and University
Professor, USC Davis School of Gerontology
• Jeff Karp, Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School, Co-Director of the Center for
Regenerative Therapeutics, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
• Stephen Minger, Chief Scientist, Cellular Sciences, GE Healthcare Life Sciences, UK
Networking Lunch & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
8:00 am
8:00 am
9:00 am
9:30 am
10:30 am
12:00 pm
Day 1: Thursday, August 21, 2014
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[Ballroom A] [Ballroom D] [Ballrooms BC]
Alzheimer’s Disease Session 1
This session will highlight two types of
cellular and molecular damage currently
being researched as therapeutic targets for
Alzheimer’s Disease. Speakers will discuss
how tau tangles and cell loss are believed
to lead to Alzheimer’s Disease, current
ideas on how to remove or repair tau
tangles, and how cell replacement can be
used to treat Alzheimer’s.
• Jean Hébert, Professor, Departments of
Neuroscience and Genetics, Albert Einstein
College of Medicine: A Twist of Fate -
Reprogramming Neural Precursor Cells
to Generate New Neocortical Neurons
• Einar Sigurdsson, Associate Professor,
Department of Neuroscience &
Physiology, New York University: Tau
Immunotherapy and Imaging
• Claude Wischik, Professor of Old Age
Psychiatry, University of Aberdeen,
Executive Chairman, TauRX Therapeutics,
Ltd.: Status of the First Phase 3 Clinical
Trials Targeting the Tauopathy of
Alzheimer’s Disease: Origins, Rationale
and Design Considerations
Cardiovascular Disease Session 1
Building upon the idea discussed by the
morning panel of using damage repair
therapeutics to treat the diseases of aging,
this session will consider cellular and
molecular damage that can be targeted
for cardiovascular disease therapy.
Presentations will explain how cellular or
molecular damage may lead to cardiovas-cular
disease and how this damage may
be removed or repaired.
• Guillermo Garcia Cardena, Associate
Professor of Pathology, Harvard Medical
School, Director of the Laboratory for
Systems Biology, Center for Excellence in
Vascular Biology, Brigham and Women’s
Hospital: Mechanical Forces, Vascular
Inflammation and Atherosclerosis
• W. Gray Jerome, Associate Professor and
Director, Graduate Program in Cellular
and Molecular Pathology, Vanderbilt
University Medical Center: Chewing
the Fat: Cholesterol, Autophagy and
Lysosome Dysfunction
• Michael Sherratt, Lecturer, Center
for Regenerative Medicine,
University of Manchester: Causes
and Consequences of Age-Related
Extracellular Matrix Remodelling
Toward a New Investment
Paradigm Panel
This panel will discuss the challenges in
bringing new and especially preventative
therapies to treat the diseases of aging
from the research lab to the market.
The panel will offer and discuss new
investment paradigms that could drive
drug and therapeutic development.
• David Brindley, Research Fellow,
University of Oxford/Center for the
Advancement of Sustainable Medical
Innovation: (Moderator)
• Neil Littman, Business Development
Officer, California Institute for
Regenerative Medicine
• James O’Neill, Partner and
Chief Operating Officer, Mithril
Capital Management
• Bernard Siegel, Executive Director,
Genetics Policy Institute
• Michael West, CEO, BioTime, Inc.
1:00 pm CONCURRENT SESSIONS. PLEASE CHOOSE ONE:
Conference Schedule
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Conference Schedule
Day 1: Thursday, August 21, 2014
Alzheimer’s Disease Session 2
A third type of damage being targeted for
Alzheimer’s therapeutics, A-beta aggregates,
will be discussed during this session. Speak-ers
will address how A-beta aggregates are
believed to lead to Alzheimer’s Disease and
current ideas on how to prevent or remove
them. This session will also discuss how
changing the way researchers, regulators,
and pharmaceutical companies view the
disease will change Alzheimer’s Disease
drug development. Particular attention will
be paid to the Accelerate Cure/Treatments
for Alzheimer’s Disease (ACT-AD) proposal
and recent guidance from the FDA.
• Ashley Bush, Head of the Oxidation
Disorders Laboratory, Mental Health
Research Institute, University of
Melbourne, Director of the Laboratory
for Oxidation Biology Genetics and
Aging Unit, Massachusetts General
Hospital, Associate Professor,
Department of Psychiatry, Harvard
Medical School: Iron in Aging and
Neurodegenerative Disease
• Rachelle Doody, Professor of Neurology,
Director, Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory
Disorders Center, Baylor College of
Medicine: Approaches to Brain Aging
and Alzheimer’s Disease: What are We
Learning from Clinical Trials?
• Eric Siemers, Medical Director,
Alzheimer’s Disease Team, Eli Lilly:
New Paradigms in Alzheimer’s
Disease Drug Development
Cardiovascular Disease Session 2
In this session, examples of current
pharmaceutical advances in cardiovascular
disease therapeutics will be presented.
The talks will describe how these
therapeutics remove or repair molecular
and cellular damage and, in doing so,
delay or prevent cardiovascular disease.
• Gabor Forgacs, Professor, Biophysics
Laboratory, Department of Physics
& Astronomy, University of Missouri-
Columbia, Founder, Organovo: The Role
of Bioprinting in Rejuvenation
• Linda Marban, CEO, Capricor
Therapeutics: Raising Capricor:
Building a Biotech Company
from Bench to Bedside
• James Yoo, Professor, Associate Director
and Chief Scientific Officer, Wake Forest
Institute for Regenerative Medicine:
Tissue Engineering Solutions for
Cardiovascular Tissue Pathologies
The Economic Impact of an Aging
Population on the Healthcare
System Panel
This panel will discuss the impending
economic crisis the healthcare system
will soon face caring for the ever-growing
elderly population and possible solutions
to this crisis, such as an outcomes-based
healthcare model.
• Catalina Hoffman, Founder, Catalina
Hoffmann Holding Group
• Peter Nakada, Managing Director of Risk
Markets, Risk Management Solutions, Inc.
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Performance by Comedian Hal Sparks - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Currently starring in the Disney XD show, LAB RATS, actor/comedian Hal Sparks began his
professional career while still a teenager in Chicago. As a member of the famed Second City
Troupe, his quick wit and affable personality quickly gained him recognition and acclaim
and he was named the “Funniest Teenager In Chicago” by the Chicago Sun Times. Sparks
went on to host the Emmy Award- winning “Talk Soup” on E! Entertainment Television,
winning rave reviews from fans and critics alike. He starred for five seasons on Showtime’s
hit series “Queer As Folk” and appeared in the films “Extract,” “Spiderman 2” and “Dude,
Where’s My Car?.” Sparks recently starred in his own one hour Showtime comedy special,
“Charmageddon,” which is now a best-selling DVD. He is a star commentator on VH1’s popular
“I Love the 80’s” series and can be heard every Wednesday on the nationally syndicated
“Stephanie Miller Radio Show.” Hal is also a pop culture expert and regularly appears on such
shows as “Joy Behar” and CNN’s “Your Money.” His numerous other television appearances
include “The Tonight Show,” “Larry King Live,” “Charlie Rose,” “Good Morning America,” “The
View,” “Jimmy Kimmel” and MTV. In addition to a busy acting and stand-up career, he is an
accomplished musician. Hal and his band, Zero 1, recently released their debut album.
8:00 pm
Afternoon Break & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
Advancing Regenerative Therapies in Alzheimer’s and Cardiovascular Disease Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will bring together speakers from sessions throughout the day to consider the promise
of a damage repair strategy to develop therapeutics for the diseases of aging. Discussion will
include a summary of the accomplishments of the Alzheimer’s community in suggesting an
innovative drug development strategy as well as debate about how such a strategy could
apply to cardiovascular therapies. In particular, the panel will consider the impact applying
a strategy similar to the ACT-AD proposal would have on cardiovascular disease therapeutic
development, investment in cardiovascular drug development, and the healthcare system.
• Aubrey de Grey, CSO, SENS Research Foundation: (Moderator)
• Rachelle Doody, Professor of Neurology, Director, Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory Disorders
Center, Baylor College of Medicine
• Neil Littman, Business Development Officer, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM)
• Linda Marban, CEO, Capricor Therapeutics
• Eric Siemers, Medical Director, Alzheimer’s Disease Team, Eli Lilly
Poster Session/ Buffet Dinner & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
4:00 pm
4:30 pm
6:00 pm
Conference Schedule
7

Conference Schedule
Registration (until 5:00 pm) - [LOBBY WEST]
Networking Breakfast & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
Opening Remarks by Edward James Olmos, Actor - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Keynote: Jim O’Neill, Partner and Chief Operating Officer, Mithril Capital Management:
Fight Aging with a Durable Business - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Toward a New Research Paradigm Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will explore new ways to approach research to tackle the diseases of aging. In particular,
consideration will be given to the effects a damage repair paradigm would have on developing
new strategies to identify and study therapeutic targets, fostering more collaboration between
researchers studying different diseases, and changing the way translational research and drug
development are approached.
(Moderator)
• Julie Allickson, Director, Translational Research, Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine
• Judith Campisi, Professor, Buck Institute for Research on Aging
• Howard Foyt, Vice President, Clinical Development and Chief Medical Officer, Viacyte, Inc
• Daniel Kraft, Faculty Chair for Medicine, Singularity University
8:00 am
8:00 am
9:00 am
9:30 am
10:30 am
12:00 pm
Day 2: Friday, August 22, 2014
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Cancer Session
This session will highlight current break-throughs
in cancer research. Additionally,
the impact the I-SPY TRIAL 2 (Investigation
of Serial studies to Predict Your Therapeutic
Response with Imaging and Molecular
Analysis 2) program has had on drug
development, particularly Alzheimer’s
drugs, will be discussed.
• Judith Campisi, Professor, Buck Institute
for Research on Aging: Cancer and
Aging: Rival Demons?
• Laura Esserman, Professor, Departments
of Surgery and Radiology, and Affiliate
Faculty, Institute for Health Policy
Studies and Director, Carol Franc Buck
Breast Care Center; Co-Leader, Breast
Oncology Program, UCSF Helen Diller
Family Comprehensive Cancer Center,
University of California, San Francisco:
Accelerating Knowledge Turns: The
I-SPY Model and Drug Development
• Claudia Gravekamp, Associate Professor,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine:
Curing Cancer in the Elderly Through
Novel Strategies
Parkinson’s Disease Session
This session will feature the latest in
Parkinson’s Disease research. A causal
relationship between molecular and/
or cellular damage and Parkinson’s
Disease will be explored. The speakers
will also consider how this research
could lead to preventative or damage
repair treatment of the disease.
• Julie Andersen, Professor, Buck Institute
for Research on Aging: Senescence and
the Aging Brain
• Jeanne Loring, Professor, Scripps
Research Institute: Negotiating the
Mine Field in the Quest for a Parkinson’s
Disease Cell Therapy
• Dale Schenk, CEO, Prothena
Corporation: Challenges and Hopes in
Preventing and Developing Meaningful
Therapeutic Strategies for Alzheimer’s
and Parkinson’s Diseases
Risk-Benefit Analysis in Therapies for
the Diseases and Disabilities of Aging
Today, the translation of healthcare
innovations into patient outcomes is
an inherently multi-stakeholder effort.
Consequently, there is a major need to
maintain rigor and independence in the
regulation of healthcare innovations,
while improving regulatory transparency
and opportunities for multi-stakeholder
input to accommodate fundamental
changes in the life-science ecosystem and
global healthcare demands. A key strategy
in this endeavor is the development and
utilization of novel risk-benefit appraisal
methodologies, leveraging advances
in patient reported outcomes (PROMS),
stratified medicines – including ‘big data’
and risk management methodologies
utilized presently in other industries.
• Richard Barker, Director, Center for
the Advancement of Sustainable
Medical Innovation
• Chris Hornsby, Head of Model
Development, Life Risks, Risk
Management Solutions, Inc.
• Brock Reeve, Executive Director, Harvard
Stem Cell Institute
2:30 pm Afternoon Break & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
Conference Schedule
9

Conference Schedule
Day 2: Friday, August 22, 2014
Performance by Comedian Dan Nainan - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Dan Nainan got his start by taking a comedy class to get over the nervousness of speaking
on stage in his job as a demo engineer with Intel Corporation. After leaving Intel to pursue
comedy, he has toured with Russell Peters and other notable comedians. Dan has appeared
on network television including “Last Comic Standing” as well as in feature films, on radio
and in an Apple commercial. He just completed a comedy tour of India.
8:00 pm
Advancing Regenerative Therapies in Cancer and Parkinson’s Disease Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will bring together speakers from throughout the day to summarize the impact of
the I-SPY TRIAL 2 program on drug trial design for Alzheimer’s therapeutics and speculate on
the applicability of trial designs similar to the one proposed for Alzheimer’s Disease to the
development of therapeutics for other diseases of aging, such as Parkinson’s Disease and cancer.
• Rachelle Doody, Professor of Neurology, Director, Alzheimer’s Disease and Memory Disorders
Center, Baylor College of Medicine
• Laura Esserman, Professor, Departments of Surgery and Radiology, and Affiliate Faculty,
Institute for Health Policy Studies and Director, Carol Franc Buck Breast Care Center; Co-Leader,
Breast Oncology Program, UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, University
of California, San Francisco
• Jeanne Loring, Professor, Scripps Research Institute
• Brock Reeve, Executive Director, Harvard Stem Cell Institute
• Dale Schenk, CEO, Prothena Corporation
Networking Dinner/ Poster Session & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
3:30 pm
5:30 pm
Concert by Cecilia Noël
Originally from Lima, Perú, Cecilia’s career began at the age of eight with a starring role in a
Peruvian television show. As a teenager, Cecilia’s mother sent her to Argentina and Germany
to take voice, violin, and piano lessons. Encouraged by the legendary Stan Getz to move to the
US, Cecilia relocated to New York City and briefly performed as a dancer with Jo Jo’s Dance
Factory and Menudo. Cecilia moved to Los Angeles in 1989 and in the early 1990s formed
Cecilia Noël and The Wild Clams. The group received quick attention for their explosive live
shows and were consequently booked at the House of Blues and the Playboy Jazz Festival.
Critics have long called her the “Latin Tina Turner.” “Salsoul”, the genre Cecilia created to
describe her sound, combines elements of salsa, soul, jazz, funk, and Afro-cuban. Cecilia also
performs and records with husband and former Men At Work frontman Colin Hay.
10

Networking Breakfast & Exhibits - [Ballrooms EFGH]
Conference Schedule
Keynote: Peter Diamandis, Co-founder and Vice Chairman, Human Longevity, Inc, Founder and
CEO, X PRIZE Foundation: Creating a Culture of Innovation and Breakthroughs - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Applying a Damage Repair Paradigm to Developing Therapies for the Diseases of Aging
Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
Building upon the discussion of a damage repair paradigm from days 1 and 2, this panel will weigh
the benefits of application of a damage repair paradigm to drug development to combat the
diseases of aging. Discussion will include the feasibility of applying such a strategy, the advantages
and disadvantages such a model would confer, and an analysis of the regulatory changes that
would be required to make such a paradigm possible.
(Moderator)
• Julie Allickson, Director, Translational Research, Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine
• Evan Snyder, Director, Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, Director, Stem Cell Research
Center and Core Facility, Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute
8:00 am
9:00 am
10:00 am
11:30 am
Day 3: Saturday, August 23, 2014
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Conference Schedule
Day 3: Saturday, August 23, 2014
Musculoskeletal Disease Session
This session will highlight current muscu-loskeletal
disease research. Presenters will
discuss how molecular or cellular damage
is believed to lead to their musculoskeletal
disease of interest and how their research
may contribute to delaying or preventing
the disease.
• Christy Carter, Assistant Professor,
Department of Aging and Geriatric
Research, Institute on Aging, University of
Florida: What is Sarcopenia? Definitions,
Diagnosis and Developing Interventions
• Young Jang, Assistant Professor,
Georgia Institute of Technology: The
Rejuvenation of Aged Skeletal Muscle
by Systematic Factors
Diabetes Session
Breakthroughs in diabetes research will be
presented in this session. The molecular
and cellular causes of diabetes will be
considered and strategies to remove, repair,
or replace such damage will be discussed.
• Camillo Ricordi, Stacy Joy Goodman
Professor of Surgery, Distinguished Professor
of Medicine, Director, Diabetes Research
Institute and Cell Transplant Program,
University of Miami: Cellular Therapies
and Regenerative Medicine Strategies
for Treatment of Diabetes
• David Schaffer, Professor, University of
California, Berkeley, Director, Berkeley
Stem Cell Center: Molecular Elucidation
and Engineering of Stem Cell Therapies
for the Nervous System
Regulating a Damage Repair
Approach to Cure the Diseases of
Aging Panel
Escalating societal healthcare needs have
driven an unprecedented era of biomedical
innovation. However, the development of
candidate technologies without consider-ation
of a robust regulatory strategy is likely
to contribute to stymied patient access and
commercial viability. Therefore, this session
will consider worldwide efforts to rapidly
and proportionally develop international
regulatory processes to accommodate
increasingly heterogeneous and unfamiliar
healthcare technologies and their swift
translation from lab to bedside.
• Bob Clay, Chief Regulatory Officer,
Kinapse & Manging Director, Highbury
Regulatory Science
• Andrew Martello, Managing Director,
Spoonful of Sugar
• Evan Snyder, Director, Center for
Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine,
Director, Stem Cell Research Center
and Core Facility, Sanford-Burnham
Medical Research Institute
12

Break
Advancing Regenerative Therapies in Musculoskeletal Disease and Diabetes Panel - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will bring together speakers from the morning sessions to consider the possibility of
applying a drug trial design similar to the ones emerging from the Alzheimer’s Disease and cancer
communities. The feasibility of applying such a model will be considered with the biology of the
disease, regulatory concerns, and pharmaceutical needs in mind.
• Christy Carter, Assistant Professor, Department of Aging and Geriatric Research, Institute on
Aging, University of Florida
• Andrew Martello, Managing Director, Spoonful of Sugar
• Camillo Ricordi, Stacy Joy Goodman Professor of Surgery, Distinguished Professor of Medicine,
Director, Diabetes Research Institute and Cell Transplant Program, University of Miami
• Young Jang, Assistant Professor, Georgia Institute of Technology
Building a Rejuvenation Biotechnology Industry - [Ballrooms ABCD]
This panel will synthesize the discussions from all of the conference sessions and panels. A cross-section
of academics, pharmaceutical reps, policy makers, and other presenters will revisit the
merits of a damage repair paradigm to address the diseases of aging considered at this conference.
Panelists will consider the changes that would be required to lay the groundwork for a new industry
perspective focused on addressing damage indications for the diseases of aging either through
preventing or repairing such damage.
• Michael Kope, CEO, SENS Research Foundation: (Moderator)
• George Church, Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Professor of Health Sciences
and Technology, Harvard and MIT
• Dana Goldman, Leonard D. Schaeffer Chair and Director of the Schaeffer Center for Health Policy
and Economics, University of Southern California
• Brock Reeve, Executive Director, Harvard Stem Cell Institute
Conference Concludes
1:30 pm
2:00 pm
3:00 pm
4:30 pm
Conference Schedule
13

Julie Allickson
Dr. Allickson focuses
on the translation of
regenerative
medicine products
including cell
therapy, tissue
engineering,
biomaterials and
devices. This process
begins at Proof-of-
Concept where early discussions with
regulators and clinicians are critical in
moving the technology from the bench to
the bedside.
Prior to joining the institute, she was an
Executive Officer of the company and Vice
President of Laboratory Operations and
R & D at Cryo-Cell International, Inc., an
AABB accredited Cord Blood Bank. Prior to
this position, she worked for the Univer-sity
Of Miami School Of Medicine, Diabe-tes
Research Institute as the Laboratory
Director of the cGMP Hematopoietic Cell
Processing Facility. She was responsible
for the design and implementation of the
State Licensed Clinical Flow Cytometry
Laboratory.
Dr . Allickson was the lead in Regulatory
Affairs for the processing laboratory of Islet
and Hematopoietic Cell products which
included oversight of all Investigational
New Drugs (IND) and external regulations.
Prior to this, she worked for the American
Red Cross managing the Hematopoietic
Cell Processing and Platelet Serology
Laboratory and serving as a member of the
National Stem Cell Task Force.
She has a Doctorate in Health Sciences and
a Master’s Degree in Medical Laboratory
Sciences. She is one of the founding mem-bers
of the International Society of Cellular
Therapy and a member of the American
Association of Blood Banks (AABB) for 25
years. She is currently Chair of the AABB
Standards Committee for Cell Therapy
Product Services. Dr. Allickson is also on
the Technical Advisory Board for Tissue
Engineered Products under ICCBBA and the
ISCT Commercialization Committee.
Julie Andersen
As a renowned
expert on Parkin-son’s
disease, Dr.
Andersen is
pursuing a wide
array of leads
toward treatments
for this complex
neurodegenerative
disorder. She has
identified several early risk signals for
Parkinson’s, an age-related illness that
causes a progressive decline in movement
and muscle control. The symptoms can
include shaking hands and difficulty with
walking.
Amongst the early risk signals identified
by Dr. Andersen are elevated levels of iron
and declining amounts of a protective
antioxidant called glutathione. Recently,
the Andersen lab has also discovered
valuable clues by examining the roles
of enzymes and other proteins involved
in nerve cell degeneration. Normally,
proteins carry out the routine work inside
cells. But some enzymes can promote the
symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. Blocking
those enzymes might slow down the
disease. Other therapies might result from
the opposite tactic: reinforcing the work
of different enzymes that guard against
Parkinson’s disease. These enzymes seem
to prevent damage to genes that protect
the nervous system.
The Andersen lab is also involved in identi-fying
potential biomarkers for Parkinson’s
that may allow early interventional therapy.
Dr. Andersen earned a doctorate in
Neuromolecular Biology at the University
of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She
completed a postdoctoral fellowship at
Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts
General Hospital before going to the
University of Southern California as an
assistant then an associate professor at the
Andrus Gerontology Center. She joined the
Buck Institute in 2000.
Richard Barker
Richard is a strategic
advisor, speaker and
author on health-care
and life
sciences. He is
Director of the
Centre for the
Advancement of
Sustainable Medical
Innovation, a major
European initiative aimed at transforming
the R&D and regulatory processes in life
sciences to bring advances more rapidly
and affordably to patients.
He is also chairman of the South London
Academic Health Science Network, accel-erating
innovation in this region of the
NHS, and Chairman of Stem Cells for Safer
Medicines, a public-private partnership
developing stem cell technology for
predicting the safety profile of new medi-cines.
He is a board member of Celgene, a
major US-based bio-therapeutics company
and of iCo Therapeutics, a Canadian
bioscience company.
His 25-year business career in healthcare
has spanned biopharmaceuticals, diag-nostics
and medical informatics – both in
the USA and Europe. Most recently he was
Director General of the Association of the
British Pharmaceutical Industry, member
of the Executive Committee of EFPIA (the
European industry association) and Council
member of IFPMA (the international
equivalent).
As a co-founder of Life Sciences UK,
member of the NHS Stakeholder Forum,
vice-chair of the UK Clinical Trials Collab-oration
and in many other roles, he has
advised successive UK governments on
healthcare issues, especially those relating
to developing, valuing and using new
healthcare technologies.
His past leadership roles include head of
McKinsey’s European healthcare practice,
General Manager of Healthcare Solutions
for IBM and Chief Executive of Chiron
Diagnostics. He was also Chairman and
Chief Executive of Molecular Staging, a US
bioscience company, now part of Qiagen.
Speaker Biographies
14

David Brindley
David is an interna-tional
thought-leader
in the
translation of
life-science
innovations into
commercially viable
products and
services. His
expertise spans the
‘Valley of Death,’ encompassing regulation,
engineering and finance. Currently David’s
professional activities include: research into
the optimization of risk: benefit appraisal
techniques for healthcare innovations,
leading the CASMI Translational Stem Cell
Consortium and providing timely and
pragmatic advice to a range of stakeholders
in healthcare translation, notably the
venture capital community.
Examples of David’s work can be found in
a range of high impact journals including
Nature, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Medi-cine
and Cell Stem Cell. David also produces
a popular blog, Cell Therapy Industry 2027,
with the Centre for the Commercialisation
of Regenerative Medicine. David is an
active Fellow of the Royal Institution of
Great Britain and the Royal Society for the
Advancement of Arts and Manufacturing.
David has successfully passed the Charted
Analyst in Alternative Investments (CAIA)
Level 1 examination.
David completed his undergraduate studies
in Biochemical Engineering at University
College London (with First Class Honors) and
his Masters, investigating the commercial-ization
of regenerative therapies, jointly at
the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Harvard
Business School. Currently he is pursuing a
DPhil (PhD) in Musculoskeletal Sciences at
the University of Oxford.
Ashley Bush
Ashley I. Bush (MB
BS, DPM, FRANZCP,
PhD, FTSE) heads
the Oxidation
Biology Unit at the
Florey Institute of
Neuroscience &
Mental Health, is
Professor of
Neuroscience and
Pathology at The University of Melbourne,
NHMRC Australia Fellow, co-director of
Speaker Biographies
biomarker development for the Australian
Imaging Biomarker Lifestyle Study (AIBL),
Chief Scientific Officer of the Cooperative
Research Center for Mental Health, and has
staff appointments in Psychiatry and Radiol-ogy
at the Massachusetts General Hospital.
He has received numerous awards includ-ing
the Potamkin Prize and the Beeson
Award. Professor Bush has authored over
300 publications, with >21,000 citations
(the most highly-cited Australian neurosci-entist
of the last 10 years), 23 patents and
founded 4 biotechnology companies. His
lab discovered the interaction of beta-am-yloid
with transitional metals as a major
factor in Alzheimer’s disease pathology, as
well as the roles of APP and tau in neuronal
iron homeostasis.
Judith Campisi
Judith Campisi
received a PhD in
Biochemistry from
the State University
of New York at Stony
Brook, and post-doctoral
training in
cell cycle regulation
and cancer at the
Dana-Farber Cancer
Institute and Harvard Medical School. As an
Assistant Professor at the Boston University
Medical School, she began to focus her
laboratory on role of cellular senescence in
suppressing the development cancer, but
soon became convinced that senescent cells
also contributed to aging. She left Boston
University as an Associate Professor to
accept a Senior Scientist position at the
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in
1991. In 2002, she established a laboratory
at the Buck Institute for Age Research,
where she is a Professor.
At both institutions, Campisi established
a broad program to understand various
aspects of aging, with an emphasis on the
interface between cancer and aging. Her lab-oratory
made several pioneering discoveries
in these areas. Her research continues to
challenge and alter existing
In recognition of the quality of her research
and leadership, Campisi received numerous
awards, including two MERIT awards from
the US National Institute on Aging, awards
from the AlliedSignal Corporation, Geron-tological
Society of America and American
Federation for Aging Research, and the
Longevity prize from the IPSEN Foundation.
She serves on numerous national and
international editorial and advisory boards.
Guillermo García-Cardeña
Guillermo Garcia
Cardena is an
Associate Professor
of Pathology at
Harvard Medical
School, and the
Director of the
Laboratory for
Systems Biology at
the Center for
Excellence in Vascular Biology, Brigham and
Women’s Hospital, Boston. He received his
Ph.D. degree from Yale University, working
with William C. Sessa on the molecular
regulation of nitric oxide production in
vascular endothelium. His postdoctoral
research with Michael A. Gimbrone Jr. at
Harvard Medical School was on studies of
endothelial cell gene expression, hemody-namics,
and atherogenesis.
Christy Carter
Dr. Carter received
her PhD in Experi-mental
and Biologi-cal
Psychology from
the University of
North Carolina at
Chapel Hill and her
post-doctoral
training at The Wake
Forest University
School of Medicine in Winston-Salem,
North Carolina.
Globally , Dr. Carter’s current research inter-ests
lie in preserving physical function and
healthspan during aging; and in particular
focuses on the use of a preclinical rodent
model of aging to test a variety of late-life
interventions designed to mitigate sarco-penia.
Furthermore, she has demonstrated
that the application of standardized physical
performance measures to a variety of animal
models of aging may help to define simi-larities
between species in the underlying
mechanisms of sarcopenia, the age-related
decline in performance, disability, and
longevity. Indeed the assessment of behav-ioral
outcomes is essential for measuring the
efficacy of any late-life intervention in the
context of mitigating declining performance
and improving healthspan. She has extended
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this area of research to other special aging
populations such as the frail and obese, and
has developed combinatorial therapies,
using these compounds in conjunction with
behavioral modification such as exercise.
George Church
George Church is
Professor of Genetics
at Harvard Medical
School and Director
of PersonalGenomes.
org, which provides
the world’s only
open-access
information on
human Genomic,
Environmental & Trait data (GET). His 1984
Harvard PhD included the first methods for
direct genome sequencing, molecular
multiplexing & barcoding. These led to the
first genome sequence (pathogen, Helico-bacter
pylori) in 1994. His innovations have
contributed to nearly all “next generation”
genome sequencing methods and compa-nies
(CGI, Life, Illumina, nanopore). This plus
chip-based DNA synthesis and stem cell
engineering resulted in founding additional
application-based companies spanning
fields of medical diagnostics (Knome,
Alacris, AbVitro, Pathogenica ) and synthetic
biology / therapeutics ( Joule, Gen9, Editas,
Egenesis, enEvolv, WarpDrive).
He has also pioneered new privacy, bio-safety
, environmental & biosecurity policies.
He is director of NIH Center for Excellence
in Genomic Science. His honors include
election to NAS & NAE & Franklin Bower
Laureate for Achievement in Science. He has
coauthored 330 papers, 60 patents & one
book (Regenesis).
Bob Clay
Bob Clay recently
established his own
regulatory consul-tancy
practice
through Highbury
Regulatory Science,
prior to this he was
a VP Global
Regulatory Affairs
at AstraZeneca with
responsibility for oncology, infection and
personalised healthcare. Bob is Chief
Regulatory Officer at Kinapse and a
member of the board of TOPRA. He is a
member of the Expert Scientific Advisory
Committee for Medicines for Malaria Venture
(MMV) and several working groups at CPTR
(Critical Path for TB Regimens). He has an
interest in the impact of regulation on the
development of innovative medicines and
healthcare policy matters.
Bob is a regulatory strategist with more than
30 years’ experience in drug development,
leading the global regulatory approval of
products across a range of therapy areas
including metabolic diseases, neuroscience,
cancer and infection. Bob graduated in
Pharmacy from the University of Bath and
subsequently completed an MSc in BioPhar-macy,
from the University of London, and an
MBA, from the Open University. Following
completion of his professional training in
hospital pharmacy he joined the pharma-ceutical
industry as a formulation scientist
at the UK laboratories of Rhone-Poulenc.
Later, he joined the UK Licensing Authority
as a pharmaceutical assessor and has held
regulatory affairs leadership roles with
several pharmaceutical companies including
Wellcome, Zambon, Pfizer and AstraZeneca.
Aubrey de Grey
Dr. de Grey is the
biomedical geron-tologist
who
researched the idea
for and founded
SENS Research
Foundation. He
received his BA in
Computer Science
and Ph.D. in Biology
from the University of Cambridge in 1985
and 2000, respectively. Dr. de Grey is
Editor-in-Chief of Rejuvenation Research, is a
Fellow of both the Gerontological Society of
America and the American Aging Association,
and sits on the editorial and scientific
advisory boards of numerous journals and
organizations. He is the Chief Science Officer
of the SENS Research Foundation.
Peter Diamandis
Dr. Peter H. Diamandis
is an international
pioneer in the fields of
innovation, incentive
competitions and
commercial space.
In the field of
Innovation, Diamandis
is Chairman and CEO
of the X PRIZE Foundation, best known for its
$10 million Ansari X PRIZE for private
spaceflight. Today the X PRIZE leads the world
in designing and operating large-scale global
competitions to solve market failures.
Diamandis is also the Co-Founder and
Vice-Chairman of Human Longevity Inc. (HLI),
a genomics and cell therapy-based diag-nostic
and therapeutic company focused on
extending the healthy human lifespan. He is
also the Co-Founder and Executive Chairman
of Singularity University, a graduate-level
Silicon Valley institution that studies expo-nentially
growing technologies, their ability
to transform industries and solve humanity’s
grand challenges.
In the field of commercial space, Diamandis
is Co-Founder/Co-Chairman of Planetary
Resources, a company designing spacecraft
to enable the detection and mining of
asteroid for precious materials.
Diamandis is the New York Times Bestselling
author of Abundance – The Future Is Better
Than You Think. Abundance was #1 on
Amazon and #2 on New York Times. He was
also named one of “The World’s 50 Greatest
Leaders” – by Fortune Magazine.
He earned an undergraduate degree in
Molecular Genetics and a graduate degree in
Aerospace Engineering from the Massachu-setts
Institute of Technology, and received his
M.D. from Harvard Medical School.
Diamandis’ mission is to open the space
frontier for humanity. His personal motto is:
“The best way to predict the future is to create
it yourself.”
Rachelle Doody
Dr. Doody is the Effie
Marie Cain Chair in
Alzheimer’s Disease
Research and
Professor of
Neurology at Baylor
College of Medicine,
where she directs
the Alzheimer’s
Disease and Memory
Disorders Center (ADMDC). She received a B.A.
from Rice University, a M.D. from Baylor
College of Medicine, and completed intern-ship
and residency training at the Royal
Victoria Hospital and Montreal Neurologic
Institute in Montreal, and at Baylor College of
Speaker Biographies
16

Medicine and has a Ph.D. in Cognitive
Anthropology from Rice University where she
studied the brain and language.
She has published over 170 original research
articles, most dealing with the diagnosis,
progression, or treatment of Alzheimer’s
Disease. She has received multiple research
grants, including a Zenith Award from
the National Alzheimer’s Association, and
designed and conducted numerous clinical
trials of Alzheimer’s Disease therapies. She
participates in National and International
collaborative efforts, review boards, and
advisory boards including Steering
Committees for the NIH AD Cooperative
Study and AD Neuroimaging Initiatives, and
the Steering Committee for the Texas AD
Research and Care Consortium.
Current research interests include studies to
understand and model the progression of
Alzheimer’s Disease, studies of clinical het-erogeneity,
and research and development
of new medications to treat Alzheimer’s
Disease. She works with many biopharma-ceutical
and large pharma collaborators in
the assessment and experimental testing of
a diverse group of potential AD therapies.
She has served on the Texas Council on
Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders,
and the Board of Directors for the Houston
and Southeast Texas Chapter of the Alzhei-mer’s
Association.
Laura Esserman
Dr. Esserman is a
surgeon and breast
cancer oncology
specialist, and is the
Director of the Carol
Franc Buck Breast
Care Center at the
University of
California, San
Francisco (UCSF). In
1996, she started the Center of Excellence for
Breast Cancer Care at UCSF to integrate
clinical care and research, automate tools for
the capture of patient and clinical data, and
develop systems to tailor care to biology,
patient preference, and performance.
Dr. Esserman is nationally and internationally
known as a leader in the field of breast
cancer and has published over 200 articles.
She served as a member of a taskforce for
President Obama’s Council of Advisors on
Science and Technology (PCAST) Working
Speaker Biographies
Group on Advancing Innovation in Drug
Development and Evaluation. The group was
tasked with making recommendations to
the federal government about how to best
support science-based innovation in the
process of drug development and regulatory
evaluation.
She is the Principle Investigator of the I-SPY
TRIAL program, a multi-site neoadjuvant
clinical trial (which includes phase 2 and
3 trials) that has evolved into a model for
translational research and innovation in
clinical trial design. Dr. Esserman has recently
launched a University of California-wide
breast cancer initiative called the Athena
Breast Health Network, a program designed
to follow 150,000 women from screening
through treatment and outcomes, incorpo-rating
the latest in molecular testing and
web-based tools into the course of care.
Athena is in the final stages of launching a
statewide demonstration project and phase
1/2 trial of personalized screening.
Caleb Finch
Caleb Finch Ph.D. is
ARCO Professor of
Gerontology and
Biological Sciences
at the University of
Southern California,
with adjunct
appointments in the
Department of
Anthropology,
Molecular Biology, Neurobiology, Psychol-ogy,
Physiology, and Neurology. Major
research interest is the neurobiology of
aging and human evolution. Finch received
his undergraduate degree from Yale in 1961
(Biophysics) and Ph.D. from Rockefeller
University in 1969 (Biology).
His life work is the fundamental biology of
human aging, started in grad school and
continued since 1972 at USC. Discoveries
include a new form of neurotoxicity of
amyloid peptides relevant to Alzheimer
disease and the role of shared inflammatory
pathways in normal and pathological aging
process. Fifteen of his mentored students
hold senior positions in universities or
pharmaceutical corporations.
Finch has received most of the major awards
in biomedical gerontology, including the
Robert W. Kleemeier Award (1985), the
Sandoz Premier Prize (1995), and the Irving
Wright Award (1999). He was founding
Director of the NIA-funded USC Alzheimer
Disease Research Center (1984), and
continues as coDirector and coPI. He also
co-founded Acumen Pharmaceuticals,
which develops therapeutics for Alzheimer
disease. He has written four books, most
recently, The Biology of Human Longevity:
Inflammation and Nutrition in the Evolution
of Lifespans (Academic Press, 2007). Recent
interests include the paleopathology of
human aging and emerging environmental
factors in aging, particularly air pollution
components from fossil fuels.
Gabor Forgacs
Dr. Gabor Forgacs is
a theoretical
physicist turned
bioengineer turned
innovator and
entrepreneur. He is
the George H.
Vineyard Professor of
Biological Physics at
the University of
Missouri-Columbia, the Executive and
Scientific Director of the Shipley Center for
Innovation at Clarkson University and
scientific founder of Organovo, Inc. and
Modern Meadow, Inc.
He was trained as a theoretical physicist
at the Roland Eotvos University, Budapest,
Hungary and the Landau Institute of
Theoretical Physics, Moscow, USSR. He
also has a degree in biology. His research
interests span from topics in theoretical
physics to physical mechanisms in early
embryonic development.
He is the co-author of the celebrated
text in the field, “Biological Physics of
the Developing Embryo” (Cambridge
University Press, 2005) that discusses the
fundamental morphogenetic mechanisms
evident in early development. These
mechanisms are being applied to building
living structures of prescribed shape and
functionality using bioprinting, a novel tis-sue
engineering technology he pioneered.
He is the author of over 160 peer-reviewed
scientific articles and 5 books.
He has been recognized by numerous
awards and citations. In particular, he
was named as one of the “100 most
innovative people in business in 2010” by
FastCompany.
17

Howard Foyt
Howard Foyt, M.D.,
Ph.D. FACP, Vice
President, Clinical
Development and
Chief Medical Officer
at ViaCyte, Inc., has
over 18 years of
clinical development
experience in
pharmaceutical and
biotechnology environments. Dr. Foyt’s
background as an endocrinologist and his
multiple NDA and IND applications
position him as ViaCyte’s strategic leader
for clinical and regulatory operations. Prior
to ViaCyte, Dr. Foyt served as Senior Vice
President and Chief Medical Officer at
Cebix, Inc., a company focused on treat-ments
for complications of type 1 diabetes.
Before Cebix, he was Vice President,
Clinical Development at Metabasis
Therapeutics, Inc. Dr. Foyt’s pharmaceutical
experience includes senior positions at
Pfizer Global Research & Development and
Parke-Davis Pharmaceutical Research.
As a clinician, Dr. Foyt was Assistant
Professor and Medical Director of
the University Diabetes Center at the
University of Texas Medical Branch. He
earned his medical degree from Baylor
College of Medicine where he also earned
a Ph.D. in Cell Biology. Dr. Foyt completed
his residency in internal medicine at
Baylor and an endocrinology fellowship
at the National Institute of Diabetes and
Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National
Institutes of Health.
Dana Goldman
Dana Goldman is a
Professor and the
Leonard D. Schaeffer
Chair in Health
Policy at the
University of
Southern California.
He is also the
inaugural director of
the Schaeffer Center
for Health Policy and Economics, one of the
nation’s premier health policy research
institutions. Dr. Goldman is the author of
over 150 articles and book chapters,
including publications in the most presti-gious
medical, economic, health policy, and
statistics journals. He is a health policy
advisor to the Congressional Budget Office,
Covered California (California’s insurance
exchange), and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer
Institute. He serves on several editorial
boards including Health Affairs and the
American Journal of Managed Care, and is
the founding editor of the Forum for Health
Economics and Policy. Dr. Goldman’s work
has been featured in the New York Times,
Wall Street Journal, Washington Post,
Business Week, U.S. News and World Report,
The Economist, NBC Nightly News, CNN,
National Public Radio, and other media. In
2009, he was elected to the National
Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine
in recognition of his professional achieve-ment.
He was the first recipient of the
MetLife Foundation’s Silver Scholar Award,
honoring his research on aging; the Eugene
Garfield Economic Impact Prize, recogniz-ing
outstanding research demonstrating
how medical research impacts the econ-omy;
the National Institute for Health Care
Management Research Foundation award
for excellence in health policy; and the
Alice S. Hersh New Investigator Award
recognizing contributions of a young
scholar to health services research. He is
also a founder and managing director of
Precision Health Economics, a consulting
firm to the health care industry. Dr. Gold-man
received his B.A. summa cum laude
from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in
Economics from Stanford University.
Claudia Gravekamp
Claudia Gravekamp,
PhD, is an Associate
Professor in the
Department of
Microbiology and
Immunology of the
Albert Einstein
College of Medicine
in New York, and a
member of the
Albert Einstein Cancer Center. She received
her PhD in 1988 in the field of Tumor
Immunology at the Erasmus University in
Rotterdam, The Netherlands. From 1987
to1993, she served as head of the Labora-tory
for Leptospirosis at the Royal Tropical
Institute in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In
1993, she started as a Research Fellow in
Medicine at the Channing Laboratory of the
Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard
Medical School, and soon became an
Instructor in Medicine until 1998. There, she
developed vaccines against Group B
Streptococcus and gained expertise in the
design and development of gene-driven
vaccines. From 1998 to 2006, she was an
Associate Member in the Institute for Drug
Development of the Cancer Therapy and
Research Center and an Assistant Professor
at the University of Texas Health Science
Center, in San Antonio, where she began to
develop a program aimed at genetic
vaccines for breast cancer. From 2006-2008,
she was a Scientist at the California Pacific
Medical Center Research Institute in San
Francisco, continuing to develop novel
immunotherapeutic approaches to cancer
using attenuated Listeria monocytogenes as
a platform to deliver anti-cancer agents
selectively to the tumor microenvironment
at young and old age. She has been funded
by grants from the NIH, other grant agencies
and private industry since 1999, published
55 scientific articles, is a member of the
Editorial Board of Mechanisms of Ageing
and Development, and is ad-hoc reviewer
for various scientific journals.
Catalina Hoffman
Catalina Hoffman is
a leader in the
elderly sector for her
trajectory as
entrepreneur,
business woman
and Hoffmann
Method’s creator.
She graduated with
a PDD from the IESE
Business School of Navarra University. She
has studied Occupational Therapy and is a
specialist in cognitive stimulation. The
Hoffmann Method offers an innovative
system of care and personalized attention
which takes into account the physical,
cognitive, psychological and social areas. It
has achieved improvements in the health
and quality of life of many people. It
includes a network of partners in the social,
health, scientific and technological sphere.
She is a member of the Board of Spain Start-up’s
Governing Council. She was named
President of SECOT in June 2013. She is
an associate and mentor of the European
Professional Women’s Network. From
this network, she is godmother of Mapel
Project of Ayuda en Acción (NOG), aimed to
craftswoman entrepreneurs in Ecuador.
She also received national and international
recognitions including The Harvard
Business School Expansion Award for the
Speaker Biographies
18

Entrepreneurship. She was added to The
Top 100 Women Leaders in Spain 2012.
Plataforma Editorial published her first
book “Emprender soñando”. The Prince of
Girona Foundation granted her the Award
of Business Woman 2013. The Association of
Young Entrepreneur of Madrid named her
the Young Entrepreneur of Madrid 2014.
In 2013, she created the Catalina Hoffmann
Holding Group, a group of companies
specialized in different areas of science,
health, health care, new technologies,
consulting, innovation and development
of new products and services. It includes
Vitalia, Hoffman Elderly,Hoffmann Health-
Care Innovation and Catalina Hoffmann
Foundation.
Chris Hornsby
Chris’ academic
background is in
applied mathemat-ics
and epidemiol-ogy,
his doctoral
research at Univer-sity
College London
was focused on
probabilistic models
of the multistage
development of cancer. Chris joined the
LifeRisks group at RMS in 2008 working
initially as lead developer of the RMS
Longevity Risk Model and subsequently
more broadly on insurance capital reserv-ing
and risk transfer applications in respect
of both life catastrophe and longevity.
Chris has played a key role, through the
provision of expert risk analysis, in the early
development of capital markets based
solutions for hedging longevity risk.
Jean Hébert
Jean Hébert Jean
Hébert completed
his PhD at the
University of
California, San
Francisco, under the
mentorship of Gail
Martin where he
studied cell-signaling
factors that regulate
some of the early steps in mammalian
development. For these studies, he used
embryonic stem cells and mouse genetics.
As a postdoctoral fellow in Susan McCon-nell’s
lab at Stanford University, he then
focused his attention on how the neocortex,
Speaker Biographies
the part of our brains that we use for our
highest cognitive and perceptual functions,
develops. Continuing along these interests,
he currently heads his own research lab at
the Albert Einstein College of Medicine
where his group has primarily undertaken
two lines of investigation.
The first is understanding how a simple
sheet of neuroepithelial cells early in
embryogenesis develops into the adult
neocortex, seat of our consciousness.
Conditional genetic approaches in the
mouse, whereby candidate genes that
regulate neocortex formation are deleted
or overexpressed specifically in neural
precursor cells, comprise the central method
driving these studies.
The second line of investigation aims to
establish ways of regenerating the principle
neurons of the adult cerebral cortex when
these neurons are lost due to trauma or
degeneration, including degeneration due
to aging. Since endogenous precursors do
not replace cortical neurons when they are
lost, two strategies are being developed:
manipulating these precursors with molec-ular
genetic techniques to start generating
neurons and transplanting engineered
precursors that are programmed to disperse
in the cortex and differentiate into cortical
projection neurons.
Young Jang
Young Jang received
his Ph.D. in Biomedi-cal
Sciences (Cell
Biology) from
University of Texas in
2008, and completed
his postdoctoral
training from
Barshop Institute for
Longevity and Aging
Studies and the laboratory of Amy Wagers
at Harvard University and Harvard Stem
Cell Institute. In 2014, he was appointed as
an Assistant Professor in the School of
Applied Physiology and a faculty member
in the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengi-neering
and Bioscience at Georgia Institute
of Technology.
The primary research focus of the Jang
laboratory is to understand the molec-ular
and biochemical mechanisms of
age-related muscle loss and function. The
Jang laboratory applies bioengineering
approaches and stem cell-based therapies
to study skeletal muscle dysfunction
during aging and in age-associated muscle
diseases. The laboratory develops and
applies novel tools using a combination of
animal and stem cell models.
W. Gray Jerome
Dr. Jerome is
Associate Professor
of Pathology,
Microbiology and
Immunology and
Associate Professor
of Cancer Biology at
Vanderbilt Univer-sity.
He is also
Co-Director of the
Cell Imaging Shared Resource at Vanderbilt.
Jay is a Past-president of the Microscopy
Society of America, the Co-Editor of a
textbook on confocal microscopy, and an
Editor for the journal Microscopy and
Microanalysis.
Jay’s research focuses on intracellular lipid
metabolism and how disruption of normal
lipid metabolism contributes to disease. His
most recent studies investigate how lipids,
particularly cholesterol, affects lysosome
function and how alterations in lysosome
function feedback to influence lipid
metabolism. Lysosomes are key homeo-static
organelles and lysosome dysfunction
is associated with a number of diseases
that become more prevalent with age. Dr.
Jerome has shown that cholesterol overload
inhibits lysosome function and disrupts cell
homeostasis, particularly in inflammatory
cells which can easily become overloaded
with cholesterol. His group has also shown
that lysosomal cholesterol-engorgement
shifts other aspects of cellular lipid balance
in ways that can push cells further into the
disease state.
Jeffrey Karp
Jeff Karp is an
Associate Professor
at Brigham and
Women’s Hospital,
Harvard Medical
School, and is
Principal Faculty at
the Harvard Stem
Cell Institute and
affiliate faculty at MIT
through the Harvard-MIT Division of Health
Sciences and Technology. His research uses
19

materials and biology to solve medical
problems with emphasis on nanoscale/
microscale materials and bio-inspiration. He
has published more than 100 peer-reviewed
papers and book chapters and has given over
130 national and international invited lectures
and has 50 issued or pending patents. Several
technologies that he has invented are
currently being translated into medical
products to improve the quality of life of
suffering patients.
In 2011 the Boston Business Journal recog-nized
Dr. Karp as a Champion in Healthcare
Innovation and in 2013 the Institute for
Chemical Engineers (IChemE) awarded one
of his technologies the Most Innovative
Product of the Year. MIT’s Technology
Review Magazine (TR35) also recognized
Dr. Karp as being one of the top innovators
in the world under the age of 35. He has
received the Society for Biomaterials Young
Investigator Award and his work has been
selected as one of Popular Mechanic’s
“Top 20 New Biotech Breakthroughs that
Will Change Medicine”. Dr. Karp was also
elected in 2013 to the American Institute
for Medical and Biological Engineering’s
College of Fellows and as a Kavli Fellow.
Dr. Karp is also an acclaimed mentor. He
was selected as the Outstanding Faculty
Undergraduate Mentor among all Faculty
at MIT and received the HST McMahon
Mentoring award for being the top mentor
among all faculty who mentor Harvard-
MIT students.
Michael Kope
Michael Kope is
President, Chief
Executive Officer,
and Co-founder of
the SENS Research
Foundation. Mr.
Kope received his
J.D. from the
University of
Michigan in 1990.
He has served as the University of
Michigan’s Intellectual Property Counsel;
as Director of Corporate Development for
Aviron, and for MedImmune, Inc.; and as
CEO and officer of a number of start-ups in
the biotechnology space. He specializes in
business development and consulting,
and is widely experienced with biotech-nology
organizations.
Mike has negotiated a broad range of
business acquisition and partnership
agreements, designed strategies for
technology protection and promotion in
many fields of research, and facilitated a
number of successful startups.
Daniel Kraft
Daniel Kraft is a
Stanford and
Harvard trained
physician-scientist,
inventor, entrepre-neur
and innovator.
Dr. Kraft has over 20
years of experience
in clinical practice,
biomedical research
and healthcare innovation. Daniel chairs
the Medicine track for Singularity Univer-sity
and is Founding Executive Director for
FutureMed (now called Exponential
Medicine), a program which explores
convergent, exponentially developing
technologies and their potential in
biomedicine and healthcare.
Following undergraduate degrees at
Brown University and medical school at
Stanford, Dr. Kraft was board certified in
the Harvard combined Internal Medicine
and Pediatrics residency program at the
Massachusetts General Hospital and
Boston Children’s Hospital. He went on
to complete Stanford fellowships in
hematology/oncology & bone marrow
transplantation, and to conduct extensive
research in stem cell biology and
regenerative medicine. He has multiple
scientific publications (including in the
journals Nature and Science) and medical
device, immunology and stem cell related
patents through faculty positions with
Stanford University School of Medicine
and as clinical faculty for the pediatric
bone marrow transplantation service at
University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Kraft recently founded Bioniq Health,
focused on enabling connected, data
driven, and integrated personalized
medicine. He is also the inventor of the
MarrowMiner, an FDA approved device
for the minimally invasive harvest of
bone marrow, and founded RegenMed
Systems, a company developing tech-nologies
to enable adult stem cell based
regenerative therapies.
Neil Littman
Neil Littman is the
Business Develop-ment
Officer at the
California Institute
for Regenerative
Medicine. Mr.
Littman is responsi-ble
for facilitating
opportunities for
outside investment
in stem cell research in California by
biopharma companies, investors, and
disease foundations.
Prior to joining CIRM in 2012, Mr. Littman
was a Senior Associate in the Merchant
Banking Group at Burrill & Company, a
diversified global financial services firm
focused on the life sciences industry based
in San Francisco. While at Burrill & Company,
Mr. Littman’s responsibilities included both
strategic advisory and capital raises for
biopharma companies throughout the U.S.
and internationally.
Mr. Littman’s strategic advisory experience
includes buy-side and sell-side M&A, as well
as in-licensing and out-licensing of both
development stage and commercial prod-ucts.
Prior to joining Burrill & Company in
2009, Mr. Littman worked in the Healthcare
Investment Banking group at Thomas Weisel
Partners where he focused on strategic
advisory and public and private financings.
Prior to Thomas Weisel Partners, Mr. Littman
worked in the Healthcare Investment
Banking group at Deutsche Bank Securities.
Mr. Littman received a Master of Science
in Biotechnology with a concentration in
Biotechnology Enterprise from The Johns
Hopkins University, and a Bachelor of Arts in
Molecular, Cellular and Development Biology
from the University of Colorado Boulder.
Jeanne Loring
Jeanne Loring, Ph.D.,
is a Professor and
the founding
Director of the
Center for Regenera-tive
Medicine at The
Scripps Research
Institute in La Jolla.
Her research team
focuses on large-scale
analysis of genomics and epigenetics
of human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) and
Speaker Biographies
20

their derivatives, in order to ensure the
quality and safety of these cells for clinical
use. The team’s translational projects include
development of cell therapies for Parkin-son’s
disease, multiple sclerosis, and
Alzheimer disease, and epigenetic modeling
of autism. The team is also producing an
ethnically diverse library of iPSC (induced
pluripotent stem cell) lines for use in
pharmaceutical screening. In addition, her
lab is developing a “zoo” of induced
pluripotent stem cells from endangered
species to aid in their conservation.
Dr. Loring is committed to educating both
scientists and the public. She has trained
more than 400 scientists over the last 10
years in intensive laboratory courses in
human ES and iPSC biology, and is author
of a comprehensive laboratory manual on
human pluripotent stem cells (“Human
Stem Cell Manual: a Laboratory Guide, in
second edition, 2012). She is frequently
quoted in major newspapers, and gives
numerous public lectures and interviews
to inform the public about biological and
societal issues associated with stem cell
research, including the ethics of stem
cell generation and clinical use, the legal
implications of stem cell patents, and
public education about the dangers of
unregulated stem cell treatments (“stem
cell tourism”). Dr. Loring serves on both
bioethics and scientific advisory boards.
Linda Marban
Linda Marban is
currently CEO,
President and
Director of Caprico
Therapeutics. She
combines her
background in
research with her
business experience
to lead Capricor and
create a path to commercialization for its
novel stem-cell cardiac therapies. Dr.
Marban was the lead negotiator in procur-ing
the license agreements that are the
foundation of Capricor’s intellectual
property portfolio. Under her direction as
Chief Executive Officer, Capricor secured
approximately $27.0 million in nondilutive
grants and a loan award which funds
Capricor’s R&D programs and clinical trials
involving its CAP-1002 product. Dr. Marban’s
deep knowledge of the cardiac space in
particular, allows her to provide unique
Speaker Biographies
direction for the company’s development
and growth. From 2003 to 2009, Dr. Marban
was with Excigen, Inc., a biotechnology
start-up company, where she was responsi-ble
for business development, operations,
pre-clinical research, and supervising the
development of gene therapy products in a
joint development agreement with Gen-zyme
Corp. While at Excigen, she also
negotiated a joint development and
sublicense agreement with Medtronic Corp.
utilizing Excigen’s technology and super-vised
the building of a lab in which the work
was to be performed.
Dr . Marban began her career in academic
science at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation
working on the biophysical properties of
cardiac muscle. She moved to a postdoc-toral
fellowship at Johns Hopkins University
and advanced to the rank of Research
Assistant Professor in the Department of
Pediatrics, continuing her work on the
mechanism of contractile dysfunction in
heart failure. Dr. Marban earned a Ph.D.
from Case Western Reserve University in
cardiac physiology.
Andrew Martello
Andrew Martello is
co-founder & CEO of
Spoonful of Sugar
(SoS). He leads an
expert team
developing
academically-led
adherence consul-tancy
and evi-dence-
based
adherence solutions to global healthcare
providers and the pharmaceutical industry.
SoS is a University College London spinout
company that applies the learnings of a
15-year research program in behavioral
medicine, specifically, how patients engage
with long-term illnesses and treatment.
Over the past five years, Andrew has
been directly involved in the planning
and implementation of multi-country
adherence and patient support programs
utilizing the latest research into illness and
medicines-related behavior. As part of this
work, Andrew has led the development of
proprietary software designed to diagnose
and treat both perceptual and practical
barriers to optimal adherence at an
individual patient level.
Passionate about the role of digital
technology in changing health behaviors,
Andrew’s main interest is the role of
personalized medicine, from both a clinical
and psychological perspective and its real
world application.
Prior to founding SoS, Andrew spent over
ten years working for and consulting with
the pharmaceutical industry, predominantly
in HIV medicine.
Much of his work in this field focused on
the development of strategies supporting a
greater understanding of the patient’s per-spective
throughout the drug development
and product lifestyle pathway. This included
the development of novel formulations and
devices, packaging and support services to
optimize the use of medicines.
This work not only focused on the devel-oped
world but also included innovative
strategies to widen access to medicines
throughout the developing world.
Andrew’s previous assignments have been
with GlaxoSmithKline, Abbott Laboratories,
Novartis and Sandoz Biopharmaceuticals.
Stephen Minger
Dr. Stephen Minger
received his PhD in
Pathology (Neuro-sciences)
in 1992
from the Albert
Einstein College of
Medicine in New
York City. After
post-doctoral work
in central nervous
system gene therapy, neural transplantation
and neural stem cell biology, he was
appointed a Lecturer in Biomolecular
Sciences at King’s College London in 1998.
He was appointed a Senior Lecturer in Stem
Cell Biology in 2005 and was the Director of
the Stem Cell Biology Laboratory from 2002
until joining GE Healthcare in 2009.
Over the past 20 years, Stephen’s research
group has been at the forefront of human
stem cell research. In 2002, they were
awarded one of the first two licenses
granted by the UK Human Fertilisation and
Embryology Authority for the derivation
of human embryonic stem (hES) cells and
his group was the first to deposit a hES cell
line into the UK Stem Cell Bank. Stephen’s
21

was also one of the first two groups in the
UK to be granted a research license by
the HFEA in 2008 to pursue Somatic Cell
Nuclear Transfer (SCNT) to generate “hybrid
human embryos” for fundamental research
into genetic forms of neurodegenerative
conditions. He was activity involved with
the UK Department of Health and in the
consultation that led to the passage of
the Human Embryo Bill of 2009 and the
inclusion of new forms of animal-human
embryos within primary legislation.
In the summer of 2013, Stephen was
appointed Chief Scientist for Cellular
Sciences, GE Healthcare Life Sciences, and
is now responsible for long-term global
research strategy for technology develop-ment
in cell therapy, regenerative medicine,
cellular technologies, in vivo diagnostic
imaging and molecular pathology/person-alized
medicine.
Peter Nakada
Peter Nakada leads
the RMS Capital
Markets and
LifeRisks groups.
After joining the
company in 2005,
he formed the RMS
Capital Markets
group to provide an
infrastructure for
capital markets participants to understand
catastrophe risk. He focuses on taking the
company’s catastrophe risk expertise into
adjacent markets and leads the RMS
LifeRisks team to provide excess mortality
and longevity risk analytics to life insurers
and capital markets investors.
Nakada began his career in financial services
as a general account fixed income portfolio
manager for Prudential Insurance Company.
Prior to joining RMS, Nakada was a partner
at Oliver, Wyman & Company, where he
specialized in advising banks and insurers
on aspects of risk, capital, and shareholder
value. In 2000, Nakada co-founded ERisk,
a spinoff from Oliver, Wyman & Company,
which provides software-as-a-service for
enterprise risk management and economic
capital quantification.
Nakada has co-authored many articles on
topics related to risk, capital, and share-holder
value, as well as the securitization of
catastrophic risk. His articles include “Risk,
Capital & Value Measurement in Financial
Institutions – Part I: The Debtholder’s
Perspective (1998),”P&C RAROC: A Catalyst
for Improved Capital Management in
the Property and Casualty Insurance
Industry” (1999), “Understanding Longevity
Risk: Insights from Structural Cause-of-Im-provement
Models” (2012) and “Quantifying
the Mortality-Longevity Offset”(2013).
Nakada holds a bachelor’s degree in
engineering sciences from Harvard College
and a master’s degree in engineering
management from Stanford University. He
earned the Chartered Financial Analyst®
designation in 1990.
Edward James Olmos
Edward James
Olmos (Axford) has
achieved extraordi-nary
success as an
actor, producer and
humanitarian. The
Tony, Emmy and
Academy Award®
Nominated actor, is
probably best
known to young audiences for his work on
television series “Battlestar Galatica” as
Admiral William Adama. Although the
series kept the actor busy during its run
from 2003 through 2009, it didn’t stop him
from directing the HBO movie “Walkout”
in 2007, for which he earned a DGA
Nomination in the Outstanding Directorial
Achievement in Movies for Television
category.
Olmos earned two Golden Globe and
Emmy Award nominations, resulting in
a win from each. In 1988, he received an
Academy Award® nomination for Best Actor
for his starring role in Stand and Deliver
and won the Golden Globe for his portrayal
of Jaime Escalante in Stand and Deliver.
Olmos’ career in entertainment spans over
30 years. In that time he created a signa-ture
style and aesthetic that he applies to
every artist endeavor. His dedication to his
craft has brought him worldwide attention.
Olmos went on to appear in the films
Wolfen, Blade Runner, and the Ballad of
Gregorio Cortez before starring in his
biggest role to date, that of Lieutenant
Martin Castillo in the iconic 80’s television
series “Miami Vice”.
He directed and starred in his first motion
picture, American Me, in 1992.
Olmos’ passion for the arts grows every
year, but he never forgets to give back to
the communities that support him with
their dedication.
He is an international advocate, spokesman,
and humanitarian working with organi-zations
such as Thank You Ocean, Project
Hope Foundation, Children’s Hospital of
Los Angeles, The Boy’s and Girl’s Club of
America, The River Keepers, Dr. Andros’
Diabetic Foot Global Conference and he
speaks up to 150 times a year in schools,
universities, and corporations.
Jim O’Neill
Jim O’Neill is partner
and chief operating
officer at Mithril, a
growth fund for
transformative and
durable technology
companies in fields
such as cyber-security;
next
generation finance;
medical robotics; rail integration; enter-prise
cloud services; 3D seismic technol-ogy;
and data integration, visualization,
and analysis. Mithril invests with convic-tion
and helps teams successfully navigate
high-growth periods.
Before helping to launch Mithril, Jim was
a managing director of Clarium, a global
macro investment fund. He also ran the Thiel
Foundation and co-founded the 20 Under
20 Thiel Fellowship and Breakout Labs.
Previously, as the principal associate
deputy secretary of health and human
services, Jim helped manage an agency
whose 67,000 employees regulate more
than 25% of the U.S. economy. His main
areas of policy and program responsibility
included the Food and Drug Administra-tion,
the National Institutes of Health, the
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
security, intelligence, preparedness, and
health diplomacy. He also made invest-ments
in drug, vaccine, and diagnostic
research on the steering committee of
the $200 million Biomedical Advanced
Research and Development Authority.
Speaker Biographies
22

Brock Reeve
Brock Reeve is
Executive Director
of the Harvard Stem
Cell Institute. In
partnership with the
Faculty Directors, he
has overall responsi-bility
for the
operations and
strategy of the
Institute whose mission is to use stem cells,
both as tools and as therapies, to under-stand
and treat the root causes of leading
degenerative diseases.
HSCI is comprised of the schools of Harvard
University and all its affiliated hospitals and
research institutions. Under the leadership
of the Executive Committee, HSCI invests in
scientific research and its faculty has grown
to include over 300 Principal and Affiliated
members. The Institute is engaged with
several leading pharmaceutical companies
and foundations in joint research projects
and its faculty have founded several stem
cell-related startup companies and serve on
leading Scientific Advisory Boards.
Brock came to this role from the commercial
sector with extensive experience in both
management consulting and operations for
technology-based companies, with a focus
on life sciences. Brock received a BA and
MPhil from Yale University and an MBA from
Harvard Business School.
Camillo Ricordi
Camillo Ricordi is
Professor and
Director of the
Diabetes Research
Institute (DRI; www.
diabetesresearch.
org ) and the Cell
Transplant Program
Miami.
Dr. Ricordi and collaborators developed
the method for large scale production of
human pancreatic islets, and he led the
team that performed the first series of
successful clinical islet allotransplants to
reverse diabetes. The procedure is now
used by laboratories performing clinical
islet transplants worldwide. Ricordi was
president of the Cell Transplant Society,
on the NIH-NIAID Expert Panel on clinical
Speaker Biographies
approaches for tolerance induction, on
the FDA Biologic Response Modifiers
Advisory Committee and on the NIH-NIDDK
Strategic Planning Committee.
Ricordi is currently serving as Chairperson
of the NIH funded Clinical Islet Transplanta-tion
(CIT) Consortium, which standardized
cell manufacturing protocols in North
America and Europe and just completed
the first multicenter FDA Phase III trial for
what could become the first biologically
active cell product approved in the US by
the FDA.
Ricordi has received numerous honors and
awards and was also Knighted by the Presi-dent
of the Republic of Italy. He is currently
serving on the editorial boards of CellR4
(Editor-in-Chief; www.cellr4.org) and Cell
Transplantation (Co-Editor-in-Chief ). In
2013 he was appointed President of the
Ri.MED Foundation by the Italian Prime
Minister (http://www.fondazionerimed.eu),
one of the largest European investments in
Biomedical Research, Biotechnologies and
Regenerative Medicine. Ricordi also serves
as President of The Cure Alliance (www.
thecurealliance.org) and Chairman of the
Diabetes Research Institute Federation
(www.diabetesresearch.org). He has
authored over 700 scientific publications
and 19 awarded patents.
David Schaffer
David Schaffer is a
Professor of
Chemical and
Biomolecular
Engineering,
Bioengineering, and
Neuroscience at
University of
California, Berkeley,
where he also
serves as the Director of the Berkeley Stem
Cell Center. He graduated from Stanford
University with a B.S. degree in Chemical
Engineering in 1993. Afterward, he
attended Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and earned his Ph.D. also in
Chemical Engineering in 1998. Finally, he
did a postdoctoral fellowship in the
laboratory of Fred Gage at the Salk Institute
for Biological Studies in La Jolla, CA before
moving to UC Berkeley in 1999.
At Berkeley, Dr. Schaffer applies
engineering principles to enhance stem
cell and gene therapy approaches for
neuroregeneration, work that includes
novel approaches for molecular engineer-ing
and evolution of new viral vectors as
well as new technologies to investigate
and control stem cell fate decisions.
David Schaffer has received an NSF
CAREER Award, Office of Naval Research
Young Investigator Award, Whitaker
Foundation Young Investigator Award, and
was named a Technology Review Top 100
Innovator. He was also awarded the Bio-medical
Engineering Society Rita Shaffer
Young Investigator Award in 2000, the
American Chemical Society BIOT Division
Young Investigator Award in 2006, and
was inducted into the College of Fellows
of the American Institute of Medical and
Biological Engineering in 2010.
Dale Schenk
Dr. Dale Schenk,
Chief Executive
Officer of Prothena,
plc, was previously
Chief Scientific
Officer and Execu-tive
Vice President at
Elan Pharmaceuti-cals
where he
provided the
leadership and scientific direction for Elan¹s
research and development programs. Prior
to joining Elan, Dr. Schenk was a founding
scientist of Athena Neurosciences, which
was acquired by Elan Pharmaceuticals.
Dr . Schenk has pioneered the immuno-therapeutic
approaches for the treatment
of amyloidosis, as exemplified for Alzhei-mer
¹s disease, Parkinson’s disease and light
chain (AL) Amyloidosis. Dr. Schenk¹s work
in this area, as well as in early detection,
testing and other pathways to these
diseases, has led specifically to the most
advanced potential treatment approach
for Alzheimer¹s disease. Clinical trials are
also currently underway for AL amyloi-dosis
and Parkinon’s disease that utilize
immunotherapy.
Dr . Schenk earned his BA and PhD in
Pharmacology and Physiology from the
University of California, San Diego.
23

Michael Sherratt
Following a PhD
and postdoctoral
positions with
Professor Cay Kielty
Manchester,
Michael was
awarded an AgeUK
Fellowship and
Senior Fellowship.
He is currently a Lecturer in Molecular
Biochemistry at the University of Manches-ter
and director of the BioAFM (atomic
force microscopy) Facility at the same
institution. For the past four years he has
served as treasurer of the British Society for
Research on Ageing and his main research
interests are in the effects of ageing on
tissue extracellular matrix structure and
mechanical function.
Using biochemical, ultra-structural, bioin-formatic
and micro-mechanical approaches,
Michael’s work suggests that: i) elastic
fibre associated proteins (which are highly
enriched in Cys, Trp and Tyr amino acid
residues) may be differentially susceptible
to UV-radiation and oxidation in ageing
tissues and ii) the effects of ageing on tissue
mechanical properties are localized in large
arteries such as the aorta.
In collaboration with colleagues in the
Manchester X-ray Imaging Facility he is now
developing new imaging methodologies
to characterize the effects of intra-luminal
pressure on the 3D structure of young and
aged arteries.
Bernard Siegel
Bernard Siegel, J.D.,
is the founder and
Executive Director
of Genetics Policy
Institute (GPI), a
nonprofit organiza-tion
with offices in
Palm Beach, Florida;
Silicon Valley,
California and
Washington, D.C. He founded and co-chairs
the annual World Stem Cell Summit,
founded and serves editor-in-chief of the
peer-reviewed World Stem Cell Report and
is the editor of the 360 Stem Cell & Regener-ative
Medicine weekly newsletter. He
founded and is the spokesperson for the
Stem Cell Action Coalition, a 100+ member
international alliance of nonprofits and
research institutions leading the global
“Pro-Cures Movement.”
In 2002, he filed the first court case relating
to reproductive cloning and is widely
credited for debunking the claim of the
group claiming that they cloned the first
baby. He also played a pivotal leadership
role in galvanizing a global movement that
successfully lobbied the United Nations to
reject a treaty that called for a prohibition
of nuclear transfer, or therapeutic cloning.
As a recognized policy expert on stem cell
research, regenerative medicine and cloning,
he works with leading scientists and patient
advocates, raising public awareness and
educating lawmakers, the media and public
on stem cells and regenerative medicine. He
is a frequent panelist and keynote speaker
on the subject of stem cells, public policy
and patient advocacy.
Eric Siemers
Eric Siemers, M.D. is
the Senior Medical
Director of the
Alzheimer’s Disease
Global Develop-ment
Team at Eli
Lilly and Company.
He earned his MD
with highest
distinction from the
Indiana University School of Medicine in
1982. After an internship in the Department
of Internal Medicine at the Indiana Univer-sity
School of Medicine, he completed his
residency in the Department of Neurology
in 1986. Prior to joining Lilly, he founded
and headed the Indiana University Move-ment
Disorder Clinic; his previous research
included investigations of Parkinson’s
disease and Huntington’s disease, and he
established one of the first centers for
surgical PD treatments in the US.
Dr . Siemers currently directs late stage
clinical research efforts at Lilly concerning
investigational treatments for Alzheimer’s
disease, and is more broadly involved
with other neurological indications such
as Parkinson’s disease. Major research
interests include the use of biomarkers
in investigational drug research and the
development of trial designs that broadly
characterize the effects of investigational
drugs on chronic diseases.
Dr . Siemers is a founding member and
current Chair of the Alzheimer’s Association
Research Roundtable. He is a member of
the Steering Committee for the Alzheimer’s
Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI). He
served as the chair of the Industry Scientific
Advisory Board for ADNI in 2007. Dr. Siemers
is a current member of the New York
Academy of Sciences Alzheimer’s Disease
Leadership Counsel. He participated as a
member of the NIA working group that
proposed criteria for preclinical Alzheimer’s
disease in 2011. He is a past member of the
Board of Directors of the American Society
of Experimental Neurotherapeutics.
Einar M. Sigurdsson
Einar M. Sigurdsson,
Ph.D. is a tenured
Associate Professor
of Neuroscience and
Physiology, and
Psychiatry at New
York University
School of Medicine.
A native of Iceland,
he received a
master’s degree in Pharmacy from the
University of Iceland, and a Ph.D. in Pharma-cology
from Loyola University Chicago
Medical Center. He subsequently obtained
postdoctoral training at New York University
School of Medicine.
His current research focuses on pathogen-esis,
therapy and diagnosis for age-related
protein conformational disorders, in
particular Alzheimer’s disease.
His honors include a Zenith Fellows Award
and the Margaret M. Cahn Research Award
from the Alzheimer´s Association, and the
Irma T. Hirschl Career Scientist Award. He is
presently serving as a standing member on
an NIH study section.
Dr. Sigurdsson and his collaborators pio-neered
the use of modified Aβ derivatives
as potential immunotherapy for Alzheimer’s
disease. Furthermore, they showed for the
first time that active and passive immuniza-tion
as well as chelators delayed the onset
of prion disease in mice, with follow up
immunization studies leading to prevention
of clinical symptoms in mice.
On the diagnostic front, Dr. Sigurdsson
and colleagues published the initial report
on detection of amyloid plaques in living
Speaker Biographies
24

mouse brains by magnetic resonance imag-ing.
Lately, he has pioneered the approach
to harness the immune system to target
pathological tau protein in Alzheimer’s
disease and other tauopathies.
Evan Y. Snyder
Dr. Snyder earned
his M.D. and his Ph.D.
in neuroscience
from the University
of Pennsylvania in
1980. He completed
residencies in
pediatrics and
neurology at
Children’s Hospi-tal-
Boston, Harvard Medical School and
postdoctoral research at Harvard Medical
School. In 1992, Dr. Snyder was appointed an
instructor in neurology at Harvard Medical
School and was promoted to assistant
professor in 1996.
He is regarded as one of the fathers of
the stem cell field, having identified over
2 decades ago that cells that came to be
called stem cells were a source of neural
plasticity. He was the first to demonstrate
that non-hematopoietic stem cells could
mediate cell and gene replacement, home
to injury, and perform protective, trophic,
pro-regenerative, and anti-inflammatory
actions. He was the first to isolate human
neural stem cells.
In 2003, after 23 years at Harvard, Dr. Snyder
was recruited to Sanford Burnham Medical
Research Institute as professor and director
of the Stem Cells and Regeneration program.
Michael D. West
Michael D. West,
Ph.D. became Chief
Executive Officer of
Biotime during
October 2007, and
has served on the
Board of Directors
since 2002. Prior to
becoming Chief
Executive Officer, Dr.
West served as Chief Executive Officer,
President, and Chief Scientific Officer of
Advanced Cell Technology, Inc., a company
engaged in developing human stem cell
technology for use in regenerative medicine.
Speaker Biographies
Dr . West also founded Geron Corporation
of Menlo Park, California, and from 1990 to
1998 he was a Director and Vice-President,
where he initiated and managed programs
in telomerase diagnostics, oligonucle-otide-
based telomerase inhibition as
anti-tumor therapy, and the cloning and
use of telomerase in telomerase-mediated
therapy wherein telomerase is utilized to
immortalize human cells. From 1995 to 1998
he organized and managed the research
between Geron and its academic collabora-tors
James Thomson and John Gearhart that
led to the first isolation of human embryonic
stem and human embryonic germ cells.
Dr . West received a B.S. Degree from
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1976,
an M.S. Degree in Biology from Andrews
University in 1982, and a Ph.D. from Baylor
College of Medicine in 1989 concentrating
on the biology of cellular aging.
Claude Wischik
Claude Wischik is
Professor of Old Age
Psychiatry at the
University of
Aberdeen and
Executive Chairman
of TauRx Therapeu-tics.
He studied
medicine in
Australia, then PhD
and post-doctoral research at the MRC
Laboratory of Cambridge, UK. He also
completed psychiatric training in
Cambridge.
During his PhD he discovered that the
neurofibrillary tangle is composed of the
microtubule associated protein Tau. He also
discovered that they could be dissolved
by diaminophenothiazines. He established
a team which developed in vitro and in
vivo systems to establish plausibility of
developing Tau Aggregation Inhibitor (TAI)
therapy for AD.
He cofounded TauRx Therapeutics to
develop diagnostics and therapeutics for
AD based on the TAI approach. In the first
ever TAI phase 2 trial, TauRx demonstrated
the feasibility of arresting disease progres-sion
over 12 months. TauRx is currently
conducting a global phase 3 trial of its lead
compound in approximately 1,500 subjects
in 22 countries.
James Yoo
Dr. Yoo is a surgeon
and researcher. He is
currently a Professor,
Associate Director
and Chief Scientific
Officer at the Wake
Forest Institute for
Regenerative
Medicine. Dr. Yoo’s
research efforts
have been directed toward the clinical
translation of tissue engineering technologies
and cell-based therapies. Dr. Yoo’s
background in cell biology and medicine
has facilitated the transfer of several
cell-based technologies from the bench-top
to the bedside.
A few notable examples of successful clinical
translation include the bladder, urethra,
vagina and muscle cell therapy for incon-tinence.
Other technologies that are being
developed for translation include therapies
for renal, liver and cardiovascular patholo-gies,
skin bioprinting and skin expander for
the treatment of burn patients.
Dr. Yoo has served in many institutional,
national and international committees
and advisory boards. He has successfully
organized and directed many scientific
meetings and symposia, and managed
numerous multi-institutional and interna-tional
collaborative research projects and
programs. He has actively contributed to
the scientific community through publica-tion,
meeting presentations and lectures
internationally.
25

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EXCLUSIVE
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FREE 12 Month Subscription to the
AGING MATTERS™ MAGAZINE worth $48.00
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The leading peer-reviewed
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Editor-in-Chief
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The Offi cial Journal of the European Society
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SENS7 Conference
September 3 to 7, 2015
Queens’ College
Cambridge, England

SENS 2014 Conference Program Guide

SENS 2014 Conference Program Guide

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