Dr. Munster is a physician scientist who received her medical degree from the University of Bern, Switzerland. She completed her Internal Medicine training at Indiana University Medical Center and Heme-Onc Fellowship at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York where she then served on faculty as a breast cancer specialist. She subsequently joined the Division of Breast Oncology and Experimental Therapeutics Program at Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Florida, as the Scientific Director of Breast Research and Co-Chair of the Experimental Therapeutics Program prior to moving to the University of California, San Francisco. Dr. Munster is the Marian Moghadam Safinia Distinguished Professor in Residence, the Program Leader for Molecular Oncology, and the Co-Leader of the BRCA Center for Research and Hereditary Cancer Clinic at the Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Dr Munster is also the founder and current CEO of Alessa Therapeutics, a UCSF spin-off, developing organ selective localized therapeutic interventions. She serves on several NCI study sections including on the steering committee for PREVENT. Additionally, she is the Co-chair of the Experiential Therapeutics committee at the Alliance of Clinical Trials in Oncology, chairs the Exam Committee for the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM), and advises AnCan, a large national patient advocacy program as a board member.

Her NCI funded basic research laboratory is focused on epigenetic and inherited factors of tumor development and treatment. Dr. Munster’s clinical mission is to translate novel scientific discovery more rapidly to patient care by integrating multi-modality novel treatment strategies and new detection methods with the goal to allow patients with incurable cancer real time and broad access to scientific advances.

Dr. Munster has published in numerous peer-reviewed scientific journals and textbooks. She has authored ​“Twisting Fate”, a book on her journey of carrying the BRCA mutation.

Dr. Mike Varney is a pioneer drug discoverer and biotech leader. As one of the original fifteen employees at Agouron, a biotech based in San Diego, he built a team that developed protein-structure based design, a novel approach to drug discovery that is utilized globally by drug discovery teams today. In 1997, the Agouron team launched Viracept, an HIV protease inhibitor that achieved the highest first year launch sales of any biotech product at the time. Dr. Varney’s leadership at Agouron resulted in the discovery of a number of currently marketed anti-cancer agents including Xalkori and Inlyta, a drug that won the American Chemical Society’s Heroes of Chemistry Award in 2018.

In 2005, Dr Varney was recruited to Genentech, the US based R&D organization in Roche, to expand the organization’s drug discovery capabilities to include small molecules. Focused on agility and pioneering science, Varney built a team-based organization that today produces more that 40% of Genentech’s development portfolio including the marketed anticancer agents Erivedge and Cotellic

In 2015, Dr Varney was appointed Executive Vice President and Head of Genentech’s Research and Early Development (gRED) and a member of the Roche Corporate Executive Committee in Basel. In this role, he was responsible for all aspects of gRED innovation, drug discovery and development. Varney also focused on building a team-based culture empowered to clear the pathto patients. Under his leadership, gRED teams discovered and developed successful medicines that include Venclexta with AbbVie, the first bcl‑2 inhibitor and Polivy, an antibody drug conjugate for the treatment of DLBCL. Pioneering molecules in the clinic include Mosunetuzumab, a bispecific antibody targeting CD20, and GDC-9545, a next generation estrogen receptor degrader. Dr. Varney retired from Genentech in July 2020, leaving a diversity of drug platform types that includes personalized therapeutic vaccines and cellular therapies.

Currently, Dr. Varney is an advisor, Board member and SAB member for ERASCA and Numerion and an SAB member for a number private and public biotechnol­ogy companies.

Dr. Varney holds a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry from the California Institute of Technology, and was an American Cancer Society postdoctoral fellow at Columbia University.

Vandana Abramson, MD, is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Hematology and Oncology, Department of Medicine, at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. She specializes in breast cancer, with a particular interest in the mechanisms of treatment response and resistance. Her research focuses on phase I/II clinical trials of novel combinations therapies, a topic on which she has published extensively. 

Dr. Abramson has been a principal investigator on over 40 clinical trials at Vanderbilt and is currently leading several national studies. She has received numerous accolades for her clinical work and research, including the Conquer Cancer Foundation’s Advanced Clinical Research Award in Breast Cancer. 

She received her undergradu­ate degree in English and Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California, Berkeley, and her MD from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. She subsequently completed a residency in Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/​Harvard Medical School, followed by a fellowship in medical oncology at the University of Pennsylvania, where she also obtained a master’s degree in Translational Research. Dr. Abramson is an active member of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

Zelanna, was most recently Chief Medical Officer at Replicate Bioscience and has 20 years’ experience in oncology drug development across a broad platform of solid tumor and hematologic indications and drug types. Before joining Replicate, she was Chief Medical Officer at Alpine Immune Sciences and, before Alpine, she was Senior Vice President of Clinical Development at Iovance Biotherapeu­tics, where she led development programs in non-small-cell lung cancers, head and neck cancers, and combination strategies. Prior to Iovance, she spent nearly nine years at Pfizer, where she held positions of increasing responsibil­ity in global clinical development and worked on three successful global registrational studies as well as additional work across numerous other successful oncology programs. 

Prior to joining industry, Zelanna was an associate professor at the University of California, Davis. She earned her M.D. from the University of Toronto, where she completed her residency in radiation oncology at Princess Margaret Hospital. She also has a Master’s degree in Healthcare Organization Leadership from UCSD. She is an inventor on multiple patents.

Tom Knudsen is the Chief Business Officer at Totus Medicines, responsible for licensing and partnerships. Prior to joining Totus Medicines, Dr. Knudsen served as Senior Vice President of Corporate Strategy and Business Development at Catalyst Biosciences and before that he held leadership positions in big pharma at Novo Nordisk, strategy consulting at Deloitte and co-founded a software company. Beyond deal making, Dr. Knudsen has experience across the biotech/​pharma value chain from early drug discovery through to phase 3 clinical development.

Nassim Usman is the Chief Executive Officer & President of Totus Medicines.

Before joining Totus Medicines, Dr. Usman served as President, CEO and Board member at Catalyst Biosciences (NASDAQ:CBIO, now Gyre Therapeutics, NASDAQ:GYRE). Dr. Usman has an extensive background in C‑Suite management (CSO, COO, CEO and Principal Financial Officer), Board membership on and venture capital investing (Morgenthaler Ventures) in several private and public companies including Sirna Therapeutics (acquired by Merck) and Principia Biopharma (acquired by Sanofi). Dr. Usman currently serves on the boards of two private biotechnol­ogy companies. During his career, he has advanced several drugs into clinical development, executed multiple licensing deals, and raised capital through private and public financings. Dr. Usman received his B.Sc. and Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from McGill University and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at MIT.

Kiersten is a scientist-investor focused on developing deep-tech platforms in ther­a­peu­tics, agriculture and food, and industrial biotech­nology. She works with entre­pre­neurs to help them launch their businesses at their foundation and/​or to support them through successive stages.

Prior to co-founding DCVC Bio, Kiersten was an investor for a major life science firm, was a scientist, and has co-founded a series of life science companies over her career. Kiersten serves on several company boards and as a director on not-for-profit boards such as the Danforth Center for Plant Sciences and the Keystone Symposia SAB. She holds a PhD in molecular biology and genetics and an MBA from the University of Alberta.

Dr. Shokat is a Professor in the Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology department and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator with the University of California, San Francisco. He was inducted into the National Academy of Sciences (2010), the National Academy of Medicine (2011), and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2011). He commercial­ized discoveries from his laboratory through co-founding several biotechnol­ogy companies, including Araxes Pharma, eFFECTOR Therapeutics, Erasca, Intellikine, Kumquat Biosciences, Kura Oncology, Mitokinin, Revolution Medicines, and Wellspring Biosciences. He leads the Shokat lab at UCSF, which uses chemical genetics to study and target signaling proteins, with the aim of finding new ways to treat human diseases. 

Mia Wang is the Vice President of Finance at Totus Medicines. Mia has over 15 years of experience in the biotech industry across private and public biotech companies. Mia previously served as the Senior Director of Finance and Accounting at Quince Therapeutics (QNCX) and led their IPO efforts. Before Mia’s career in industry, she spent over 7 years at EY where she worked with public and pre-IPO life science and biotech clients. Mia holds a Graduate Diploma in Public Accountancy and a Bachelor of Commerce in Accounting from McGill University.

Neil Dhawan is the Co-founder of Totus Medicines, where he focused on combining small molecule design, structural biology, genetics, biochemistry, and cell biology to design new classes of drugs to target untreatable diseases. Dr Dhawan continues to serve on the BoD.

Chhokar brings nearly 20 years of human resources experience to Totus, where she is responsible for leading the company’s people and culture strategy as Chief People Officer. Prior to Totus, Chhokar served as the vice president and head of human resources at Nurix Therapeutics, and director of human resources at InterMune, another highly successful biotechnol­ogy organization.

Tom Hughes has more than 30 years of industry experience in the discovery, development, and commercial­iza­tion of pharmaceuti­cal products. Tom has served since 2018 as President and CEO of Navitor Pharmaceuti­cals, a privately-held biopharmaceu­ti­cal company.

Prior to joining Navitor, Tom served as President and Chief Scientific Officer, and earlier as CEO of Zafgen, Inc. Prior to Zafgen, Tom held several positions at Novartis, including Global Head of the Cardiovascu­lar and Metabolic Diseases Therapeutic Area at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research. In these roles, he oversaw many drug discovery and development projects targeting major global aging-related health issues including obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.

Prior to co-founding DCVC Bio, John was a VP at Monsanto and Managing Director of Monsanto Growth Ventures (MGV). Before joining MGV, John was a Managing Director at Burrill & Company. Prior to his career in venture capital, John was an entrepreneur, initially at Paradigm Genetics, where he joined as a visiting scientist before becoming Chief Science Officer and eventually President and CEO following the company’s IPO. After Paradigm, John founded and served as CEO of Arête Therapeutics, which earned backing from leading life science venture firms.

John started his career in academia, rising to the rank of Full Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Purdue University, where he was a David and Lucille Packard Fellow and an NSF Presidential Faculty Fellow. John received a B.Sc. and an M.Sc. from the University of Windsor and a Ph.D. in Microbiology from the University of California, Davis.

Most recently, Dr. Gottlieb served as the 23^rd Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administra­tion (FDA) from 2017 to 2019. Prior to serving as Commissioner, Dr. Gottlieb held several roles in the public and private sectors including serving as Managing Director, T.R. Winston & Company from 2013 to 2017. Dr. Gottlieb was previously the FDA’s Deputy Commissioner for Medical and Scientific Affairs from 2005 to 2007, as well as the senior advisor to the FDA Commissioner from 2003 to 2004. Dr. Gottlieb is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and is a Contributor to the financial news network, CNBC. He also serves on the boards for Pfizer, Illumina, Aetion, and Tempus.

Steve Liapis is a Managing Director at Northpond Ventures where he focuses on biotechnol­ogy platforms and therapeutics and leads Northpond’s newco incubation efforts with the Wyss Institute at Harvard and the School of Engineering at MIT. Steve is a Board Director at Aro Biotherapeu­tics, Garuda Therapeutics, Incendia Therapeutics, Kyverna Therapeutics (NASDAQ: KYTX), Opna Bio, Scipher Medicine, and Totus Medicines. Previously, Steve was Director of Portfolio Decision Resources at Sanofi, where he led global strategy and resource prioritiza­tion for Sanofi Oncology. Prior to Sanofi, Steve was Head of Strategy at Arbor Biotechnolo­gies and served in leadership positions at L.E.K. Consulting where he focused on R&D and commercial strategy for immuno-oncology as well as advanced therapeutic modalities including gene therapy, gene editing, and cell therapy. Steve holds a Ph.D. in molecular biology from Harvard University where he trained in the laboratory of Dr. John Rinn, focusing on the discovery and molecular characteri­za­tion of novel long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), as well as identifying the role of lncRNAs in disease pathogenesis. He also holds a Master’s Degree in Genetics and Plant Biology from Yale University and an undergradu­ate degree in environmen­tal science from Stockton College.