ERIC OSTERTAG, M.D., PH.D., Chief Executive Officer
Dr. Ostertag completed his undergraduate training at the University of Wisconsin where he received a B.S. in Genetics with Honors. He went on to do both M.D. and Ph.D. (Molecular Biology) degrees at the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn). He later completed a residency program in Clinical Pathology and a Fellowship in Transfusion Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. He is the founder and CEO of Transposagen. While at Transposagen, Dr. Ostertag secured greater than $4.1 million in early stage funding from regional networks and the NIH. He is one of the co-inventors of Transposagen’s technology and has published nearly twenty peer-reviewed articles and reviews in the field of mobile elements. He has received numerous scientific and clinical awards including best genetic research by a pre-doctoral student by the American Society of Human Genetics, best abstract award from the American Society for Apheresis and a fellowship from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Dr. Ostertag previously co-founded PhenoTech where he served as Executive Vice President and Vindico NanoBioTechnology, Inc., where he has served as President & CEO.
JOSEPH C. RUIZ, PH.D., VICE PRESIDENT OF RESEARCH GRANTS
Dr. Ruiz is a stem cell biologist with over 19 years experience in embryonic, hepatic and adipose stem cell systems. He received his Ph.D. in Biology at the University of California at San Diego and pursued his post-doctoral training at Columbia and Harvard Universities in the fields of embryonic stem cell and developmental biology. At the Indiana University School of Medicine (1999-2006), Dr. Ruiz established a novel stem cell core facility (Animal Stem Cell Core) dedicated to the derivation, genetic manipulation, and in vitro and in vivo developmental analysis of embryonic stem cell lines from transgenic and knockout mouse embryos. In this capacity, Dr. Ruiz has acquired extensive experience in optimizing conditions for embryonic stem cell derivation and expansion as well as developing high-throughput differentiation assays. In addition from 2006 to 2009, Dr. Ruiz was Director of Research and Development at Vesta Therapeutics (Research Triangle Park), where he was responsible for developing protocols for manufacturing stem cell-derived hepatic cells for drug discovery and therapeutic applications.
Carlisle P. Landel, Ph.D., Director, Custom Animal Model Division
Dr. Landel received his undergraduate degree in biology with honors from the University of California at Santa Cruz and his Ph.D. in Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology from the University of Colorado at Boulder. With a career in transgenic technologies dating back to 1986, when he was a postdoc at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, he is an expert in the production of rodent transgenic models and in mouse germplasm cryopreservation. Most recently the Director of the Transgenic and Gene Targeting Facility at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, he has also worked at the Jackson Laboratories, the A.I. DuPont Hospital for Children and the University of California at San Diego.
Jack Crawford MS, Vice President, Business Development
Jack Crawford received his undergraduate degree in biochemistry from Virginia Tech and his Master’s degree in biotechnology from the University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Crawford began his career at Transposagen as in intern, focusing on product collaboration and business development, while attending graduate school in 2008. Mr. Crawford has been promoted multiple times at Transposagen, first to Business Development Manager and most recently to Vice President of Business Development at Transposagen. He has experience in marketing, sales, product development, licensing, technology and patent evaluation and is a co-author on several patents and scientific journals.
Key Collaborators & Scientific Advisory Board (SAB)
J. Keith Joung, Ph.D. (Massachusetts General Hospital) – Dr. Joung is a major contributor to the site-specific nuclease field and the inventor of the XTNTM FLASH TALEN system. J. Keith Joung is Associate Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Associate Chief of Pathology for Research and the Jim and Ann Orr Research Scholar at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). He is also the Director of the Molecular Pathology Unit, an Associate Pathologist, and a member of the Center for Cancer Research and the Center for Computational and Integrative Biology at MGH. He received his A.B. in Biochemical Sciences (magna cum laude) from Harvard College in 1987 and his M.D. and Ph.D. (in Genetics) from HMS in 1996. He is the recipient of an NIH Director’s Pioneer Award (2010), a NIH Transformative R01 award (2010), and the Jim and Ann Orr MGH Research Scholar Award (2011).
Mac Fraser, Ph.D. (University of Notre Dame) – Dr. Fraser discovered, characterized, and developed the piggyBac transposon genetic vector system for genetic engineering of eukaryotic systems. Dr. Fraser received his B.S. (Biology) Wheeling College, Wheeling, W. Va., 1975. And Ph.D. (Entomology), at The Ohio State University 1979-81. He is a Rev. Julis A. Nieuwland, CSC, Professor of Biological Sciences at the Notre Dame University.
Kent Hamra, Ph.D. (University of Texas – Southwestern) – Dr. Hamra Assistant Professor of Pharmacology at the University of Texas Southwestern. He has contributed to the study of animal genetics by discovered and patented rat spermatogonial stem cells and the media used to culture them.
Aron Geurts, Ph.D. (Medical College of Wisconsin) - Dr. Geurts is now an Assistant Professor of Physiology at the Medical College of Wisconsin, focusing on implementing novel strategies to manipulate the rat genome, including the use of piggyBac and TALEN technology. His research efforts are being driven by our interests in genetic manipulation of stem cells and whole animals for the annotation of gene function, tissue engineering, and cellular therapeutics related to cardiovascular disease.
Haig H. Kazazian, M.D. (University of Pennsylvania) – Dr. Kazazian is the former Chair of the Department of Genetics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and has been a major contributor to the field of mammalian mobile DNA for many years. He has published over 325 peer-reviewed articles since 1965, including frequent publications in journals such as Science, Cell, Nature, and Nature Genetics.