Stewart Campbell
Dr. Campbell joined Axial in 2016 as Vice President of Research & Development, and was appointed the company’s CEO in February 2021. in 27+ years in the pharma/biotech industry, Dr. Campbell held various leadership roles at Boehringer-Ingelheim, Insmed, Surface Logix, Ancora/Corden Pharma and Axial, Dr. Campbell has played an integral role in the discovery and development of eight clinical stage drug candidates, including the Rho kinase inhibitor belumosudil and TAK-607 (rIGF-1/BP-3). During his career Dr. Campbell has been co-inventor on 20 issued patents. He holds a BSc with Honors in Chemistry from St. Francis Xavier University, a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the Queen’s University (Canada), and did post-doctoral research at Duke University.
Wayne Finlayson
Wayne has extensive scientific and commercial corporate experience from over 35years in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector. Knowledge in regulatory structures and requirements, and experience in commercialisation of biotechnology, and the practical application of science for the creation of commercial enterprises. Wayne spent his early career years as a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of California, Berkley, following completion of a PhD in Organic Chemistry from La Trobe University. He progressed from initial roles focusing on pure scientific research to more managerial positions in the science and technology sector, including executive director of Both (NASDAQ)and ASX listed companies. Wayne founded Progen Pharmaceuticals in the early 1990’s and was managing director and CEO. After his time at Progen Pharmaceuticals, he worked as a technology investment consultant for high profile clients (including large investment firms) with responsibility for ensuring readiness of investee companies for public listing or other investment. Wayne’s experience, spanning the entire breadth of the biotechnology business spectrum, from post-doctoral researcher, to company founder and CEO, to investment consultant in the Biotechnology sector, means he has a thorough and well-rounded understanding of the challenges and expectations which need to be met to create and successfully commercialise biotechnological and pharmaceutical enterprises.
Krishna Yeshwant
Michal Daniely
Michal is the Director of the Microbiome Initiative within Merck KGaA. In this role, she is responsible for developing technologies and products to advance microbiome research. Over the past 4 years, Michal has been deeply involved in shaping the company’s strategy within the microbiome research field to support the growing need in this market. The company is using core technologies such as microbial fermentation, Next Generation Sequencing (NGS), Mass Spectrometry (MS) for metabolomics & proteomics and more, to develop tools for microbiome researchers around the globe. Michal earned her PhD degree in Human Genetics from the Sackler Medical School, Tel Aviv University, Israel. She is the author of many peer review papers and is bringing significant scientific experience. Prior to joining Merck KGaA, she held different roles in medical device and pharma companies, where she managed the R&D activities.
Katie Schubert
Joseph Maxwell
Dr. Maxwell trained as an immunologist at Oregon State University and the University of Connecticut Health Center. He spent 15 years supporting early target discovery and program leadership at Amgen, AbbVie, and Finch Therapeutics with an emphasis in inflammatory bowel disease. He is currently an Associate Director of Translational Research and Biomarkers at Takeda supporting clinical programs testing microbiome therapies and other novel modalities in IBD and celiac disease.
Jonathan Solomon
James Adams
James B. Adams, Ph.D., is the Director of the Autism/Asperger's Research Program at Arizona State University. His research focuses on the medical causes of autism and how to treat and prevent it including the areas of nutrition (vitamins/minerals, essential fatty acids, carnitine, digestive enzymes, special diets), oxidative stress, gut problems, gut bacteria, toxic metals, and seizures. He has published over 150 peer-reviewed scientific articles, including over 50 related to autism. He is also the President of the Autism Society of Greater Phoenix, the President of the Autism Nutrition Research Center, the co-leader of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Autism Research Institute, and chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Neurological Health Foundation. He has an adult daughter with autism.
Diwaker Daver
Bio: Dr. Davar is a translational oncologist whose research interests lies in translational cancer immunotherapy and early-phase clinical trials. He has been instrumental in the development of first-in-human studies evaluating novel agents targeting TIGIT, GITR, TIM-3, CTLA-3 and other immune checkpoints. Based on emerging data implicating intestinal dysbiosis in mediating non-response to PD-1 blockade, he developed a protocol evaluating fecal microbiota transplant in combination with PD-1 blockade to treat PD-1 non-responders. This first-in-human study was selected for funding by Merck to support the clinical costs. Results demonstrating that microbiome modulation reversed primary resistance to anti-PD-1 and augmented anti-tumor immunity were recently published in Science.
Nikole Kimes, Ph.D.