Introduction
Victor A. McKusick (right) died July 22 of cancer at his home in Towson, Maryland, at the age of 86. Known as the "father of medical genetics," he spent more than four decades compiling one of the world's most comprehensive public catalogs of genes—the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), now an essential reference for medical geneticists and researchers.
McKusick established the division of medical genetics at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (Baltimore, MD, USA) in 1957, where his team mapped the gene for a blood group on chromosome 1—the first gene pinned to a non-sex chromosome. In 1973 he was named chairman of the department of medicine and physician-in-chief of Johns Hopkins Hospital. He held those posts until 1985, when he was named university professor of medical genetics. McKusick's awards include the 1991 Miami Winter Symposium Distinguished Service Award, the 1997 Albert Lasker Award, the 2001 National Medal of Science and the 2008 Japan Prize in Medical Genomics and Genetics.
MicroIslet (San Diego) has appointed Brian D. Conn as vice president, corporate finance and chief financial officer. Conn has previously served as CFO of Chemicon International, Serologicals and Millipore.
Oxford BioMedica (Oxford, UK) has named John Dawson as a nonexecutive director of the company and member of the remuneration and audit committees. From 1996 to 2007, Dawson held senior management positions in the European operations of Cephalon, including CFO and head of business development, Europe.
John T. Dimos, first author of the landmark Science paper "Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells Generated from Patients with ALS Can Be Differentiated into Motor Neurons," has joined iZumi Bio (Mountain View, CA, USA). Dimos conducted his work as a postdoctoral fellow in Kevin Eggan's lab at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute.
Jurgen Engel has been promoted to the positions of president and CEO of Æterna Zentaris (Quebec City, QC, Canada), succeeding Juergen Ernst, who had been acting as interim president and CEO since April. Engel was most recently executive vice president and chief scientific officer.
Michael Henighan has been appointed CFO and principal accounting officer effective at Alpha Innotech (San Leandro, CA, USA). Before joining the company as corporate controller in May, Henighan was vice president and corporate controller at HemoSense.
Harold Jacob has been elected to the board of directors of Oramed Pharmaceuticals (Jerusalem). He is currently CEO of NanoVibronix and was previously director of medical affairs at Given Imaging Ltd.
Marinus Pharmaceuticals (Branford, CT, USA) has appointed John Krayacich as president and CEO. Krayacich brings more than 20 years of experience in pharmaceutical product development, most recently as global program head for the antidepressant agomelatine and vice president and global head of neuroscience project management at Novartis Pharmaceuticals.
Nektar Therapeutics (San Carlos, CA, USA) has named Randall Moreadith as senior vice president of drug development and chief development officer. Prior to joining Nektar, he served as executive vice president and chief medical officer at Cardium Therapeutics.
Topigen Pharmaceuticals (Montreal) has announced the appointment of Mark Parry-Billings (right) as CEO. Parry-Billings joined Topigen in 2007 as chief development officer and expanded his role to lead the company's operations this year. Previously, he served as European director and member of the board of pSiMedica, a subsidiary of pSivida, and director of R&D and board member at Innovata Biomed.
Znomics (Portland, OR, USA) has announced the appointment of Mark A. Philip as president and CEO, succeeding cofounder and interim CEO Richard Sessions, who will remain as a member of Znomics' board of directors. Philip was previously president of Stryker Biotech and president and CEO of Zycos.
Rayasam (Ray) Prasad has been appointed COO for global biologics at Biological E. (Hyderabad, India). He was most recently senior vice president at Reliance Life Sciences, where he was responsible for global quality management and regulatory compliance.
Scott C. Stromatt has been named Trubion Pharmaceuticals' (Seattle) senior vice president and chief medical officer, replacing Daniel J. Burge, who resigned for personal reasons. Stromatt was most recently executive vice president of clinical and regulatory affairs at Cell Therapeutics and previously served as vice president of clinical research and chief medical officer at Northwest Biotherapeutics.
Gilles H. Tapolsky has been named chief scientific officer of Advanced Cancer Therapeutics (Louisville, KY, USA). Tapolsky previously served as vice president, product development at Tapestry Pharmaceuticals.
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ChemGenex Pharmaceuticals (Melbourne, Australia) has announced that Jean-Luc Tétard has joined the company's board of directors effective immediately. Tétard has over 35 years experience in the pharma and biotech industries: he was founding CEO of Stragen Chemical and Stragen Pharma.
Former chairman of the board and CEO of Connetics Tom Wiggans has been appointed CEO of Peplin (Emeryville, CA, USA). Wiggans is also currently chairman of Peplin's board. In addition, Eugene Bauer has been appointed president and chief medical officer. He was most recently CEO of Neosil, which has entered into a merger agreement with Peplin.
