Sharon Nachman, M.D.

Dr. Nachman graduated from Stony Brook Medical School in 1983 and undertook her internship and residency in pediatrics at Long Island Jewish Medical Center. Her pediatric infectious disease fellowship was conducted at Lincoln Medical and Mental Health Center, and she was a postdoctoral fellow in microbiology at Rockefeller University Hospital with Dr. Alexander Tomasz from 1987-1990. Dr. Nachman is currently Professor and Division Chief of Pediatric Infectious Diseases, Associate Dean for Research, and Director of the Office of Clinical Trials at Stony Brook University. Dr Nachman is a clinician scientist with over 175 publications and  over 25 years of direct NIH funding in the field of maternal child HIV and its associated complications and co-infections including tuberculosis. She has been involved in the development and management of over 25 clinical trials, including 3 directly evaluating TB treatments and vaccines in infants and children. All studies have enrolled, analyzed and published, and have changed the way we assess, treat or evaluate HIV infected and exposed children worldwide. While much of her work has centered around these populations, she has also developed studies helping to define the dose and PK for new antibiotics, evaluate vaccines in HIV+ populations and evaluate the long-term complications seen in infants born to HIV+ women worldwide. As of 2014, she is Chair and PI of the NIH funded International Maternal Pediatric and Adolescent Clinical Trials Network.

 

John Piwinski, Ph. D.

Dr. Piwinski received his B.S. degree in Chemistry and Biochemistry from Stony Brook in 1976 and his Ph.D. in 1980 in Organic Chemistry from Yale University with Professor Frederick Ziegler. Dr. Piwinski then joined Revlon Health Care as a Senior Scientist working in the cardiovascular diseases area. In 1983, he moved to Schering-Plough where he worked in the respiratory diseases group. At Schering, he held positions of increasing responsibility and eventually oversaw Chemical Research as Vice President from 1999 to 2003 and Group Vice President from 2004 to 2008. In this position, he was responsible for overseeing drug discovery in chemistry in Kenilworth, New Jersey in the areas of respiratory, inflammation, cardiovascular, CNS, oncology and infectious diseases. In 2008, he became the Site Head and Group Vice President of Schering-Plough’s Cambridge, Massachusetts site. Research at the site focused on medicinal chemistry, affinity-based screening and optimization, bioNMR, protein science and biologics. Merck acquired Schering-Plough in 2009 and continued to operate the Cambridge site until the end of 2010. He is currently Principal of JJPiwinski Pharma Consulting, LLC in Lebanon, New Jersey and consults in the areas of medicinal chemistry and drug discovery, including small molecule lead discovery and optimization. He has over 30 years of experience in medicinal chemistry from project initiation to delivery of candidates for clinical development.

 

Jeonghoon Sun, Ph.D.

Dr. Sun graduated from Sogang University (B.S.) and POSTECH (M.S.) in Korea, where he majored in chemistry and organic chemistry. Dr. Sun received his Ph.D. from Stony Brook in 2000 with Nicole Sampson and was at UCSF as a DOD and CBCRP postdoctoral fellow in Charly Craik’s laboratory. Dr. Sun worked at Amgen for seven years developing therapeutic biologic molecules and cutting-edge antibody technologies. In 2011, he joined Eli Lilly. In 2013, Sun formed an Antibody and Protein Engineering Group at Celgene and holds the position of Senior Principal Scientist. Many biologic molecules developed by Dr. Sun have advanced into the first-in-human stage and beyond. Sun has authored 25 US and international patents and journal articles.

 

Jose Trevejo, M.D., Ph.D.

Dr. Trevejo is a board-certified internist and infectious disease physician with ~10 years of clinical experience at Harvard Medical School, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Cambridge Hospital. received his B.S. degree in Applied Mathematics from UCLA in 1994, his Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from Cornell University in 2001, and his M.D. from Weill Medical College of Cornell University in 2002.  Subsequently, he was a Clinical Fellow in Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he specialized in cardiology, oncology, bone marrow transplant and general medicine, and then he was a Clinical Fellow in Infectious Disease at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center.  Following a position as Principal Biomedical Scientist at Draper Laboratory, Dr. Trevejo assumed the position of Medical Director, Infectious Disease and Novel Therapeutics, at Vertex Pharmaceuticals in 2010.  In 2013, he accepted a position as Medical Director, Genentech Research and Early Development, at Genentech, and then moved to his current position at Visterra Inc. in 2014 where he is Vice President Development.  At Visterra his responsibilities include oversight and management of all facets of development including clinical development, clinical operations, regulatory and GCP, and he also leads global strategic development in Singapore and other ASEAN countries.  As a physician-scientist, Dr. Trevejo has extensive experience in leading multidisciplinary teams in the research and development of life-saving medicines and technologies, and has experience that includes: strategic planning and execution of clinical development plans for attainment of global regulatory approval for small and large molecule drugs, IND filing and support of NDA filing for an FDA approved anti-infective, review and mentoring of early biotechnology companies as part of a start-up incubator, leading a technology working group at Harvard focused on improving health in developing countries.