Leaders in Charcot-Marie-Tooth research need to be progressive visionaries, willing and able to push the boundaries to explore every opportunity available to advance therapeutics and clinical trials for CMT.
HNF has the great honor to have Dr. Sean Ekins lead our research operations as our Chief Scientific Officer.
Dr. Ekins is the co-founder and CEO at Phoenix Nest, a company focused on Sanfilippo Syndrome rare disease drug discovery. He is also the founder and CEO at Collaborations Pharmaceuticals, Inc., which is focused on rare and infectious diseases.
He graduated from the University of Aberdeen, receiving his M.Sc., Ph.D. and D.Sc. in Clinical Pharmacology. He was a postdoctoral fellow at Lilly Research Laboratories. He has worked as a senior scientist at Pfizer, Lilly, Associate Director of Computational Drug Discovery at Concurrent Pharmaceuticals Inc. (now Vitae Pharmaceuticals Inc), and Vice President of Computational Biology at GeneGo (now Thomson Reuters).
Dr. Ekins is Adjunct Professor, Division of Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry, UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Adjunct Associate Professor, School of Pharmacy Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Maryland, and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Pharmacology at Rutgers University– Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Piscataway, NJ.
He has authored or co-authored over 270 peer reviewed papers and book chapters, as well as edited four books and a book series on technologies for the pharmaceutical industry. He has been awarded eleven NIH grants as a Principal Investigator.
Dr. Ekins is interested in the application of computational approaches to big and small data for rare and neglected disease drug discovery. His hobbies include cycling and hunting for records.
Let’s hear more from our CSO:
HNF: What should attendees know about CMT research today?
Dr. Ekins:
As the CSO of HNF, I think it’s important to highlight what we are doing to actively fund the basic scientific research on this rare disease.
HNF: How has CMT affected your life?
Dr. Ekins:
I have a much better appreciation for those living with the disease and the daily challenges they face as I meet them through HNF and interact with them.
HNF: What do you hope attendees take away from the Summit?
Dr. Ekins:
I hope attendees see that we are hopefully at an important turning point with so much great academic science and many companies actively working on treatments for CMT. The Summit will provide the big picture view of what is going on and bring different stakeholders together.
HNF: Anything else you’d like to share with the community?
Dr. Ekins:
I look forward to personally meeting as many of you as possible and learning what more we can do to help you!!
Want to connect with Dr.Ekins?
You can find him here:
Skype: sean.ekins
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