Link Medicine > Scientific Advisory Board
"The premier innovation company in neurodegenerative disorders"
Patrick Aebischer, MD, PhD
Doctorate in Medicine (1983), Geneva University, Switzerland. From 1984 to 1992, Patrick Aebischer held various Faculty positions at Brown University, Providence, USA; In 1992, he returned to Switzerland as a Professor at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, and Director of the Gene Therapy Center of the CHUV, the Lausanne University Medical School. Since 2000, Patrick Aebischer is the President of the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. He is the founder of 3 biotechnology companies. His research expertise is in the development of animal models of neurodegenerative diseases and the development of experimental treatment for these diseases.
Robert Brown, MD, PhD
Dr. Robert H. Brown, Jr. is Director of the Day Neuromuscular Research Laboratory and Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) clinic at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School. Dr. Brown graduated from Harvard Medical School and completed his doctoral training in neurophysiology at Oxford University. Dr. Brown trained in Neurology at the Massachusetts General Hospital. In 1984, The Day Neuromuscular Research Laboratory was founded by Dr. Brown to investigate neuromuscular diseases, including Miyoshi myopathy and ALS.
Gregory Petsko, PhD
Dr. Petsko holds the Tauber chair in biochemistry and chemistry at Brandeis. He succeeded the legendary chemist William P. Jencks, the first holder of this chair. He is also Adjunct Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School and the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. From 1995-2007 he was the third Director of the Rosenstiel Basic Medical Sciences Research Center at Brandeis. Greg Petsko was one of the founders of the field of structural enzymology and protein engineering. Recently, together with his Brandeis colleague Prof. Dagmar Ringe, he has created the new field of Structural Neurology, which uses the tools of genetics, biochemistry and structure-based drug discovery to find new targets and treatments for neurologic disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Diseases. As a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Medicine, he has served on many important national committees and boards, including the Board of Chemical Sciences and the Board of Life Sciences of the National research Council. For many years he has also been a member of the Medical Advisory Board of the Howard Hughes medical Institutes. He has co-authored a widely used text on protein structure and function, which has helped open up the subject to biologists. In addition, he was founding editor of the jounal "Protein Engineering". Dr. Petsko is also co-founding scientist of a number of biotechnology companies, including ArQule, (public, NASDAQ); New Chemical Entities (sold to Albany Molecular Sciences), and Microbia (still privately held). His monthly opinion column on science and society, which appears first in the journal “Genome Biology”, is read, reprinted and quoted worldwide. He and Professor Ringe have personally trained over 100 graduate students and postdoctoral associates, including two members of the National Academy. For almost thirty years, he has taught introductory chemistry, the history of the detective story, the treatment of science in the cinema, and critical thinking courses to M.I.T. and Brandeis undergraduates, and has consistently been among the highest rated teachers at his institution.
Robert J. Zamboni, PhD
Dr. Robert J. Zamboni is a medicinal chemistry consultant to the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. Dr. Zamboni gained 25 years of industry experience at Merck/MSDRL, and he is responsible for the chemistry of multiple approved CNS and other drugs. Dr. Zamboni received a B.Sc. in Honours Chemistry and his Ph.D. in Organic Synthesis from McGill University, where he is now an Adjunct Professor of Chemistry.