Who We Are
Innovators in CNS Drug Development
Pioneers of CNS Disease Biology
Visionary Leaders with R&D Track Record
Founders
Dr. Zhigang He
Scientific Founder
Zhigang is an international leader in axon-regeneration and neurodegeneration. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Toronto and completed his postdoctoral fellowship with Marc Tessier-Lavigne at the University of California, San Francisco. Zhigang is currently Professor of Neurology and Ophthalmology at Harvard Medical School and Director of the Boston Children’s Hospital Viral Core. Among his many honors, Zhigang is a Klingenstein Fellow in Neuroscience, a John Merck Scholar and a McKnight Scholar. In 2019 and 2021, he subsequently received the Reeve-Irvine Research Medal and became an elected member of National Academy of Medicine.
Dr. Zhigang He
“Deep understanding of disease biology and mechanisms are critical when combating CNS disorders. At Myrobalan, we have the opportunity to select targets critical for the common disease mechanisms and translate the knowledge to develop drug candidates with a broad utility across many CNS indications.”
—Zhigang
Dr. Guoping Feng
Scientific Founder
Dr. Guoping Feng is a member of the National Academy of Medicines. He is an international leader in understanding synaptic mechanisms of psychiatric diseases such as OCD, autism, and schizophrenia. He received his Ph.D. from the State University of New York at Buffalo and completed his postdoctoral training at Washington University in St. Louis. Subsequently, he served as a faculty member in the Department of Neurobiology at Duke University School of Medicine. Today, Guoping is the Poitras Chair Professor of Neuroscience and Associate Director in the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT. He is also an Institute Member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard and the Director of Model Systems and Neurobiology at the Stanley Center for Psychiatric Research at Broad Institute. Guoping was elected as a member of American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019, and fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2022.
Dr. Guoping Feng
“New genetic data of psychiatric disorders, including large-scale whole exome sequencing results, revealed exciting new drug targets for these CNS conditions. Equipped with better rodent and primate models, we are now in a new and exciting era of CNS drug development.”
—Guoping
Dr. Jing Wang
Co-founder & CEO
Jing brought to Myrobalan 18 years of leadership experience in all phases of drug development from discovery to NDA/CDx & commercialization. Jing received her B.S. from Peking University School of Life Sciences and her Ph.D. from Harvard Medical School. With a career spanning a decade in Curis, Jing served on six positions working on drug discovery and clinical translational development. Subsequently, she joined TESARO in 2016 and served as a Director and Sr. Director of Translational Strategy & Research. After TESARO’s acquisition by GSK in 2019, Jing joined Constellation Pharmaceuticals as Vice President to lead the Translational Science department until the company’s acquisition by MorphoSys in 2021.
Dr. Jing Wang
“I have been lucky to be part of every step of oncology drug development from HTS to commercialization. I’m so glad that I have the chance to use my experience to develop drugs for CNS disorders, because neuroscience has always been my passion since college.”
—Jing
Boston Team
Alexandra Kapolis
Research Associate
Christie Blake
Senior Executive Assistant
Debarun Gupta
Head of Business Development
Ian Henion
Research Associate
Jessica Herbst
Director of Operations
Jing Wang, PhD
Chief Executive Officer
Julian Vasquez
Laboratory Manager
Karen Smith, MBA
Senior Director Head of Program Leadership
Michael Young, PhD
Scientist
Monica Tommet
Director, Corporate Controller
Nathan Parker, PhD
Scientist
Nora Lin, PhD
Senior Scientist
Shannon Wheeler
Research Associate
Tania Seabrook
Associate Director
Taren Ong, PhD
Senior Scientist
Xiao Han, PhD
Principal Scientist
Yi Chen, PhD
Senior Director Head of Neuroscience
Nanjing Team
Chen Chen
Research Associate
Saifei Xi
Project Manager
Tengfei Xue
Scientist
Xiaochuan Liu
Research Associate
Xiaotong Liu, PhD
Scientist
Xiaoxiao Han
Research Associate
Xuan Zou
Research Associate
Board Advisors
Grant Bogle
Senior Business Advisor
Grant Bogle
Senior Business Advisor
Grant brings a wealth of industry experience to Myro. He was the president and CEO of Epizyme, which sold to Ipsen in 2022, senior vice president and chief commercial officer at TESARO/GSK, and served in senior commercial roles at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Roche and Knoll. His proven expertise in corporate governance, financial strategy and execution, business development, P&L management and team leadership in biotech companies provide great value to Myro.
Emma Reeve
Board Advisor
Emma Reeve
Board Advisor
Ms. Reeve is an accomplished biopharmaceutical executive with more than 25 years of global financial experience across pharmaceutical, medical device, and bio-pharma companies. Ms. Reeve serves on the Board of Directors of PTC Therapeutics, Inc., Editas Medicine, Inc., Aadi Bioscience, Inc., and Ribon Therapeutics, Inc. She also serves on the Board of Trustees for Tufts Medical Center. Earlier in her career, Ms. Reeve served as Chief Financial Officer of Constellation Pharmaceuticals where she led the initial public offering and raised over $700m for the company prior to its eventual acquisition. She served as Chief Financial Officer for two other development stage bio-techs, as well as holding senior finance and operational roles at Bristol Myers Squibb, Merck, Novartis and Parexel.
Dan Passeri, MSc, JD
Board Advisor
Dan Passeri, MSc, JD
Board Advisor
Dan Passeri is a seasoned biotechnology executive with over 20 years of experience managing drug discovery and development programs as well as business development activities on behalf of publicly traded companies, with deep experience in both oncology and strategic partnership generation. Prior to joining Cue Biopharma, Mr. Passeri served as President and Chief Executive Officer as well as Vice Chairman of the Board of Curis, Inc. Prior to joining Curis, he was employed by GeneLogic Inc., most recently as Senior Vice President, Corporate Development and Strategic Planning. Prior to his work at GeneLogic, Mr. Passeri served as Director of Technology Management at Boehringer Mannheim. Mr. Passeri received a J.D. from the National Law Center at George Washington University, an M.Sc. in Biotechnology from the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of London and a B.S. in Biology from Northeastern University.
Scientific Advisors
Glenn Yiu, MD, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Glenn Yiu, MD, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Dr. Glenn Yiu is a Professor of Ophthalmology at UC Davis. He earned his dual MD-PhD degrees at Harvard Medical School, residency training at the Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary, and vitreoretinal fellowship at Duke. He joined UC Davis as a clinician-scientist and vitreoretinal surgeon in 2014, where he now leads a translational research program studying age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and other retinal diseases. His focuses include ocular imaging technologies, gene editing and delivery, and animal models of retinal disease. He reported the first use of CRISPR-based genome editing as a treatment strategy for wet AMD, discovered the use of microneedles for suprachoroidal gene delivery, and pioneered important studies on drusen evolution in rhesus monkeys. He currently serves as Director of the UC Davis Reading Center and Director of Tele-ophthalmology, where he has pioneered a teleretinal screening program to expand eye screening among diabetic patients in Northern California. Dr. Yiu has published numerous peer-reviewed scientific articles and book chapters, and is the editor of the textbook "Vitreoretinal Disorders." He also serves on the editorial board of Scientific Reports and Frontiers in Genome Editing, as a member of the ARVO Annual Meeting Program Committee, and as a course lecturer at the American Academy of Ophthalmology. He has received numerous awards including the Ronald G. Michels Fellowship, the Heed Fellowship, the Retina Society Fellowship Research Award, and the Macula Society Evangelos S. Gragoudas Award.
Susan Goelz, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Susan Goelz, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Dr. Goelz received her undergraduate degree at UC Santa Cruz in Biology and Chemistry and her Ph.D. in Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry from Yale University. In 1988, she joined the research department at Biogen and was a member of project teams that have moved drugs from development, into the clinic and finally to regulatory approval (Avonex, Tysabri, Tecfidera). In 2011, Susan joined Elan Pharmaceuticals as Vice President of Translational Science and in 2013 became an independent scientific advisor in the field of translational science with a focus on neurological diseases. Since about 2000, finding areas of collaboration between the biotech industry and academic groups has also been a major area of her focus. She has initiated and managed more than 100 collaborations in these areas. Dr. Goelz is an author on more than 60 publications, dozens of posters and lectures presented at international meetings; and is named as an inventor on several patents.
Yibing Shan, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Yibing Shan, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Dr. Yibing Shan is a world leader in the field of computational drug discovery. He has been a founding member of D. E. Shaw Research and played a key role in the conception and design of Anton Specialized Supercomputer for molecular dynamics simulations and was twice a co-recipient of the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) Gordon Bell Prize in 2006 and 2009. The Gaussian Split Ewald algorithm he developed is a key design feature of Anton Supercomputers. Yibing initiated the “swimming” simulations of biomolecular association and developed it into a simulation tool that has become integral to a number of state-of-the-art drug discovery platforms. In search for optimal strategies to apply molecular dynamics simulations to enable and expedite drug discovery, he conducted drug discovery programs targeting Mcl-1, K-Ras and Nedd4 in his 18-year tenure in D. E. Shaw Research. Since then, his research pivoted to computational structural biology and computational chemistry. His team pioneered simulation-based structural elucidation of large functional assemblies of proteins, which includes EGFR, JAK2, and Raf kinases, plexins, and Rho and Ras small GTPases.
Yin Allison Liu, MD, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Yin Allison Liu, MD, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Dr. Yin Allison Liu is an Associate Professor of neuro-ophthalmology at the University of California, Davis. With a background in cancer immunotherapy, she holds a PhD and has completed specialized training in both Neurology with a focus on Child Neurology, and neuro-ophthalmology. Dr. Liu's current research concentrates on utilizing state-of-the-art ophthalmic technology to detect changes in the eye that reflect systemic and neurological conditions. As an accomplished researcher, Dr. Liu has published numerous peer-reviewed scientific articles and book chapters. She is also an active member of the North American Neuro-Ophthalmology Society Research Committee, enabling her to collaborate with leading experts in the field and stay at the forefront of advancements. Recognized for her excellence, Dr. Liu has received several awards and was voted as one of the Sacramento's Best Doctors in 2022.
Brian Popko, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Brian Popko, PhD
Scientific Advisor
Dr. Brian Popko, a distinguished neurologist and Professor at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, is renowned for his pioneering research in demyelinating diseases like multiple sclerosis. His work has earned international acclaim, including the esteemed John Dystel Prize for Multiple Sclerosis Research. As Chairman of the Department of Neurology, Dr. Popko leads innovative studies addressing neurological disorders. Prior to Northwestern, he spent 18 years at the University of Chicago, holding various faculty roles and serving as the Jack Miller Professor of Neurological Disorders. Dr. Popko also taught at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill from 1988 to 2002, following his postdoctoral studies at Caltech.