This three-part webinar series will feature biotech industry leaders, experts, and entrepreneurs discussing COVID-19 and its impact on innovation.

In our third panel, hear from front-line workers. They’ll detail what they’re facing and how the biotech community can help.

Speakers include:

Richard Malley, Senior Physician in Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, Boston Children’s Hospital & Scientific Founder of Affinivax

Rick Malley, M.D., began his education at the Ecole Active Bilingue in Paris, France, getting his Baccalaureate in 1982. He received his B.A. from Yale University, his M.D. from Tufts University in 1990, and pediatric infectious diseases and emergency medicine training at Boston Children’s Hospital. In 1997, a chance meeting with Dr. Porter Anderson (one of the co-inventors of the Haemophilus influenzae type b conjugate vaccine) led to his interest in the development of a species-specific pneumococcal vaccine for use in developing countries and vaccinology in general. Under Dr. Anderson’s mentorship, he shifted his research to the development of novel vaccines against pneumococcus and other pathogens, leading to numerous scientific publications describing various aspects of pneumococcal pathogenesis and prevention, such as acquired and innate immunity, correlates of protection, and mechanisms of protection from nasopharyngeal colonization.

Dr. Malley is the Kenneth McIntosh Chair in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Boston Children’s Hospital and Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Malley regularly attends on the Pediatric Infectious Diseases service at Boston Children’s Hospital, providing consultation on inpatients. He is also the Director of the Travel and Geographic Medicine Clinic, providing advice, vaccines and medications to both adult and pediatric travelers.

Dr. Malley runs a research laboratory with past and present funding from the Meningitis Research Foundation, NIH, PATH and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), focusing on vaccine development for pneumococcus, Staphylococcus aureus, Salmonella typhi and paratyphi, and Mycobacterium tuberculosis and more recently SARS-CoV-2. In collaboration with PATH and the BMGF, Dr. Malley led an international effort for the development of a a pneumococcal vaccine for developing countries. In 2014, Dr. Malley and collaborators started Affinivax, a biotechnology company seed-funded by BMGF and based on a novel technology called MAPS (Multiple Antigen Presenting System) to develop vaccines for developing countries. Streptococcus pneumoniae is the lead target being developed at Affinivax. A pneumococcal MAPS vaccine is currently in Phase 2 clinical testing in older adults.

Joshua Resnick, Physician at the Department of Emergency Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and Managing Director at RA Capital Management

Josh Resnick is a Managing Director at RA Capital Management. Josh’s primary responsibility at RA Capital is to lead early-stage private investments in and oversee the creation of new companies developing drugs, medical devices, diagnostics, and research tools. Josh holds a BA in Chemistry from Williams College, an MD from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and an MBA from the Wharton School of Business. He has more than 15 years of experience in investing, company formation, and company leadership across all stages of drug development, from discovery through commercialization. Josh was previously co-lead of SV Health Investors’ US Biotech practice where he was responsible for SV’s US venture creation activities, including its incubator, Brahma Discovery. Before SV, Josh was President and Managing Partner at MRL Ventures Fund, the early-stage therapeutics-focused corporate venture fund within Merck & Co. Prior to MRL Ventures, Josh was a Venture Partner with Atlas Venture and a Partner at Prism Venture Partners, focusing on company formation and seed and Series A investing. Josh is currently a faculty member at Harvard Medical School and continues to practice medicine as an attending physician in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital

Hannu Rajaniemi, Co-Founder and CEO of HelixNano

Hannu Rajaniemi is a co-founder and CEO of HelixNano, a venture- and Y Combinator backed biotech startup. HelixNano’s ultimate mission is to build technologies that unlock a future where freedom from cancer is a fundamental human right. But right now, the fight against a global pandemic needs all scientific hands on deck. In response to this existential challenge, the team is applying its expertise to deploy a novel vaccination approach against COVID-19.

Hannu was born in Finland. At the age of eight he approached the European Space Agency with a fusion-powered spaceship design, which was received with a polite “thank you” note. Hannu studied mathematics and theoretical physics at University of Oulu and Cambridge and holds a PhD in string theory from the University of Edinburgh. He co-founded a mathematics consultancy whose clients included UK Ministry of Defence and the European Space Agency.

Hannu is the author of four novels including The Quantum Thief (winner of 2012 Tähtivaeltaja Award for the best science fiction novel published in Finland and translated into more than 20 languages). His most recent book is Summerland (June 2018), an alternate history spy thriller in a world where the afterlife is real. His short fiction has been featured in Nature, Slate, MIT Technology Review and The New York Times.

Hannu lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, neuroscientist Zuzana Krejciova-Rajaniemi, and their vizsla puppy Neo.

We hope to help you see a few steps further into the future and enjoy some realistic optimism for the next few months!

Our webinar will be hosted on YouTube Live. Registrants will receive the link in an email shortly before broadcast.

Contact emulcahy@labcentral.org with questions.