Research Committee of the Board

Member since 2024

Gary Koretzky, M.D., Ph.D. is a Professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine and Professor of Microbiology and Immunology at Cornell University.  Previously, he was the Vice Provost for Academic Integration at Cornell University and the Francis C. Wood Professor of Medicine, Vice Chair and Chief Scientific Office of the Department of Medicine, Investigator and Director of the Signal Transduction Program of the Abramson Family Cancer Research Institute at the University of Pennsylvania.  

Dr. Koretzky received his A.B. from Cornell University (’78) and obtained his M.D. and Ph.D. (Immunology) degrees at the University of Pennsylvania (’84).  Dr. Koretzky then pursued clinical training in Internal Medicine and Rheumatology at the University of California at San Francisco. He re-entered the laboratory as a postdoctoral fellow, examining the molecular events associated with T cell activation. Dr. Koretzky moved to the University of Iowa in 1991 where he continued his research examining the biochemistry and molecular biology of signal transduction in hematopoietic cells until he moved to the University of Pennsylvania in 1999. 

Koretzky’s research aims to better understand the signal transduction events that occur following engagement of the T cell antigen receptor.  He has been continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health since establishing his independent research group, as the laboratory has expanded its interests to study more globally the molecular events important for immune cell development, differentiation and function.  Initial studies focused on the CD45 tyrosine phosphatase as a positive regulator of immunoreceptor signaling.  This work led naturally to an examination of the key biochemical events that occur following receptor engagement.  The Koretzky lab approach was to identify novel regulators of signal transduction following T cell receptor ligation with studies leading to the isolation, characterization, and molecular cloning of several adapter molecules, which are critical for integration of signaling pathways.  The laboratory has identified 3 such molecules including SH2 domain-containing leukocyte protein of 76 kDa (SLP-76), adhesion and degranulation-promoting adapter protein (ADAP) and promyelocytic leukemia RARa-regulated adapter molecule-1 (PRAM-1).  There are ongoing projects studying the role of each of these molecules not only in T cells but also in other hematopoietic cells.  In addition to studies of these positive regulators of immune signaling, the Koretzky laboratory has also had a long-standing interest in signals that interfere with activation events in T cells.  This interest led to studies of FAS and FAS ligand and to the role of diacylglycerol kinases as terminators of lymphocyte activation. 

Dr. Koretzky has published more than 200 research articles.  He is a past President of the American Society of Clinical Investigation (2000) and Councilor of the Association of American Physicians (2008-2012) and Chair of the Lupus Research Alliance Scientific Advisory Board (2019-2023), is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (2004), a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (2008), a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (2012) and serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Immunological Reviews (2002-present). 

Member since 2023

Rupert Vessey graduated from Oxford University with degrees in Physiological Sciences (M.A., First Class Honors) and Clinical Medicine (B.M., B.Ch., proxime accessit). He subsequently undertook clinical training at several notable institutions in the UK including the Hammersmith Hospital at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, London, the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London and the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford. During this time, he became a Member of the Royal College of Physicians of London UK.

Rupert undertook basic research training in the laboratory of Professor Sir Stephen Bloom at the Hammersmith Hospital and under the direction of Professor Sir John Bell at the Institute for Molecular Medicine, Oxford where he completed a D.Phil in Molecular Immunology. During his research period he was a Junior Research Fellow of Merton College, Oxford and a training fellow of the UK Medical Research Council. In 2012 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, London and in 2019 he was appointed visiting Professor of Rheumatology at the University of Oxford.

Rupert joined the pharmaceutical industry in 1997 and has worked in the UK and USA. At GlaxoSmithKline he worked primarily in drug discovery, experimental medicine and early clinical development gaining experience in a wide range of respiratory and immunology projects including monoclonal antibodies, DNA vaccines, anti-inflammatory drugs and inhaled medicines for asthma and COPD including components of TRELEGY. During 10 years at Merck Research Laboratories (MRL) Rupert benefitted from diverse experiences including a period working on the clinical development of varicella vaccines where he contributed to both the refrigerator stable formulation of VARIVAX and the shingles vaccine, ZOSTAVAX.

Since 2006 Rupert held multiple roles in senior management including Vice President Molecular Profiling and Research Informatics and Site Head for Rosetta Inpharmatics, Seattle, Vice President Drug Discovery and Site Head for MRL Boston and Vice President Drug Discovery and Site Head for MRL Kenilworth. In these latter roles Rupert was responsible for a wide range of activities including Pharmacogenomics, Molecular Profiling, Informatics and drug discovery in the Respiratory, Inflammation, Oncology, Infectious Disease and Neuroscience therapeutic areas. In 2011 Rupert was promoted to the position of Senior Vice President and Head of the MRL Respiratory and Immunology Franchise. In this role he was responsible for the end-to-end discovery and development portfolio for Respiratory and Immunologic diseases and partnership with Merck’s Global Human Health Franchise. Under his leadership numerous projects were advanced through the discovery and development pipeline and approvals were achieved for RAGWITEK and GRASTEK as well as multiple supplementary indications for REMICADE and SIMPONI.

From 2013 Rupert was Senior Vice President and Head of Early Development and Discovery Sciences. In this role he was responsible for managing an organization of 1500 scientists and for devising a new operating model that integrated early clinical development with discovery and genetics to facilitate the translation of new discoveries to the clinic. Commencing in February 2015 Rupert joined Celgene as Senior Vice President of Translational Development and Head of the Immunology and Inflammation Thematic Center of Excellence and in January 2016 assumed the role of Executive Vice President and President of Global Research and Early Development. In this position Rupert was responsible for oversight of all of Celgene’s internal and external discovery research, preclinical development and early clinical development. The organization also provided translational science support to the Hematology, Oncology and Immunology Franchises. Under his leadership more than 50 compounds were advanced in the Celgene pipeline across a range of modalities including small molecules, protein degraders, biologics and cellular therapeutics. At the time of acquisition of Celgene by Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) Rupert assumed the role of Executive Vice President and President of Global Research and Early Development at BMS overseeing the work of 2500 scientists in discovery, non-clinical development, translational medicine and early clinical development. Since joining BMS further progress has been made on a range of novel programs including approvals of cell therapies BREYANZI and ABECMA as well as REBLOZYL, ZEPOSIA, OPDUALAG, SOTYKTU and CAMZYOS. In addition, numerous programs were advanced into development including an industry leading portfolio of 10 novel protein degraders and first in class cell therapies. During his time at BMS Rupert also drove a very active business development portfolio including the acquisition and integration of Myokardia and Turning Point and many early-stage deals including a series of transactions that have enabled the build of a novel pipeline of neuroscience assets.

In July of 2023 Rupert retired from his role at BMS and joined Flagship Pioneering as an Executive Partner and Chief Scientist. He also serves on the boards of BioTechne, Evotec, and The International Biomedical Research Alliance.

Member since 2024

Member since 2024

Louis J. DeGennaro, Ph.D., is founder and managing partner at Cantlous Advisory Partners, LLC (CAP), a pioneering consulting firm working at the intersection of venture philanthropy, biomedical innovation, and non-profit fundraising. CAP’s mission is to drive collaborative efforts that result in transformative advancements in healthcare. Prior to his current role, Dr. DeGennaro was president and chief executive officer of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS), a global leader in the fight against cancer with an annual budget of $500 million.

As the key architect of LLS’s cures and access agenda, Dr. DeGennaro conceived and pioneered LLS’s Therapy Acceleration Program® – a venture philanthropy approach to accelerating new treatments to patients through drug discovery and development partnerships with the biotechnology industry. LLS’s foray into venture philanthropy helped redefine the activist role of non-profits to meet urgent unmet medical needs. Under Dr. DeGennaro’s leadership LLS also launched its groundbreaking precision medicine Beat AML® Master Clinical Trial and Dare to Dream, a research, advocacy, and patient support effort that features a global, master clinical trial in pediatric leukemia.

In his operating role at LLS, Dr. DeGennaro led the growth of annual revenue from $225 million in 2015 to $500 million in 2023 through innovative fundraising programs that cut across peer-to-peer, corporate partnership, major gift, and service revenue channels.

After receiving his doctorate in biochemistry from the University of California at San Francisco, Dr. DeGennaro conducted post-doctoral research at the Yale University School of Medicine. His academic appointments included research group leader, Max Planck Institute, Munich, Germany and associate professor of neurology and cell biology, University of Massachusetts Medical School. His private sector appointments included Senior Director, Molecular Genetics, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals and Executive Vice President, Synex Pharmaceuticals. Dr. DeGennaro is the author of over 100 scientific publications.

Member since 2023

Dr. Isenberg is currently Emeritus Professor of Rheumatology at University College London having been the Academic Director of Rheumatology from 1996 to 2022. During his career, he has worked as a clinical scientist interested in the autoimmune rheumatic diseases. His particular interests have been in the structure, function and origin of autoantibodies notably anti-DNA and antiphospholipid antibodies focusing on links between structure and function. During his career, he has made and studied very intensely a set of hybridoma-derived human monoclonal anti-double stranded DNA antibodies, determining the sequence of these antibodies developing, with colleagues, computer models and showing how individual changes in individual amino acids can have profound effects on binding capacity. He also explored the use of severe combined immunodeficient [SCID] mice to study the potential pathogenic effects of these monoclonals. 

He was the President of the British Society of Rheumatology [2004-2006], Chair of its large biologic register from 2006 to 2011 and on the Executive Boards of Arthritis Research UK/Versus Arthritis and the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in the UK. He was one of the two founder members of the Lupus Academy, which now runs annual academic meetings as well as providing a wealth of other additional opportunities through the use of podcasts and educational materials. For the past three years, he has co-chaired the Lupus Community Hub at the virtual sessions organized by the American College of Rheumatology that were held during the pandemic, 2020-2022. He also chairs the Research Committee for the UK’s largest lupus charity, Lupus UK.  

Member since 2025

Soumya Raychaudhuri is the Walbert Professor of Medicine and a Professor of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School. He is also the Director of the Center for Data Sciences at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and serves as an Institute Member at the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. He is a clinically active rheumatologist at the Brigham and Women’s Arthritis Center.

After completing his undergraduate degrees in biophysics and mathematics from SUNY Buffalo in 1997, Raychaudhuri completed his M.D. and Ph.D. at Stanford University in 2004. He pursued clinical training in internal medicine, followed by subspecialty training in rheumatology at BWH. He concurrently completed postdoctoral training in human genetics at the Broad Institute with Mark Daly. In 2010, he launched his laboratory and joined the faculties of the BWH Divisions of Genetics and Rheumatology. He has published >200 peer-reviewed papers including in Nature, Nature Methods, Nature Genetics, and Nature Immunology

Raychaudhuri currently has leading research programs in the human genetics and functional genomics of rheumatoid arthritis, and other immune-mediated diseases. His work has contributed to the understanding of the genetic basis of a broad range of diseases. He devised computational and experimental methods to localize genetic association signals to causal variants and defined their cell-state-specific functional effects. He also defined the role of CD4+ T cells and fibroblasts in tissue inflammation, using single cell genomics methods. In addition to his contributions to human immunology and genetics, his lab is known for developing widely used computational methods. He is the recipient of the Doris Duke Clinical Scientist Development Award and the Henry Kunkel Young Investigator award from the American College of Rheumatology. He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation and a Fellow of The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

Member since 2019

Dr. Seder is the Chief of the Cellular Immunology Section in the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Health (NIH). Formerly, Dr. Seder was Chief of the Clinical Immunology Section in the Laboratory of Clinical Investigation at the NIH. Dr. Seder’s work focuses on the cellular and molecular mechanisms by which vaccines mediate protective antibody or T cell immunity against HIV, Malaria, Tuberculosis and personalized therapeutic cancer vaccines. Dr. Seder has advanced his scientific discoveries into clinical trials for several of these diseases. Dr. Seder received his B.A. from Johns Hopkins University, his M.D. from Tufts University, and his residency in internal medicine at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center.  He received postdoctoral training in the Laboratory of Immunology at the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) under Dr. William Paul . Dr. Seder has served on numerous scientific advisory boards as well as the Board of Trustees for Johns Hopkins University and the Hirshhorn Museum.

Dr. Seder is serving in a personal capacity; the government neither sanctions nor endorses his service.

Member since 2024

Janet Woodcock recently completed a long career at FDA. She served as Director of the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research for over twenty years in several stretches. Most recently she served as Principal Deputy Commissioner and prior to that as Acting FDA Commissioner. She held multiple other senior positions at FDA including at the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. She was the therapeutics lead for “Operation Warp Speed” during the COVID pandemic. Her most recent effort was spearheading a major reorganization of FDA’s foods program and the Office of Regulatory Affairs. Dr. Woodcock completed many major regulatory initiatives during her FDA tenure. She was instrumental in getting the biosimilars legislation enacted and worked to ensure adoption in the clinical community. Additionally, she worked with industry and Congress to bring about the first GDUFA. After passage of the legislation, she oversaw an extensive reorganization of the generic drug review program at CDER, that successfully met the aggressive targets of the legislation and led to eventual reauthorizing, with elimination of backlogs and approval of thousands of generic drugs.

Dr. Woodcock holds a Bachelor of Science in chemistry from Bucknell University, and a Doctor of Medicine from the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University Medical School (Chicago). She also completed further training and a fellowship in rheumatology, as well as held teaching appointments at the Pennsylvania State University and the University of California in San Francisco. She is board certified in internal medicine.