– USA, MA – Eleven Biotherapeutics, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company discovering and developing protein therapeutics to treat diseases of the eye, today announced the election of Barry Gertz, MD, PhD, and Jay S. Duker, MD, to the company’s Board of Directors. Each of these new Board members brings more than 25 years of experience that is relevant to Eleven’s progress in advancing its pipeline of innovative therapies for ocular diseases.
“We are excited to add these two highly accomplished industry and academic leaders to round out our Board. Their strategic support and guidance will be key as we continue to advance our ophthalmology pipeline toward commercialization including our lead product candidate, EBI-005,” said Abbie Celniker, PhD, President and Chief Executive Officer of Eleven Biotherapeutics. “With his significant experience in drug development, Barry was responsible for managing all aspects of Merck’s clinical research, and he was a key contributor to the development and approval of many new drugs and vaccines. Barry’s experience will be fundamental to our clinical and regulatory strategies. Jay’s academic and medical expertise and access to his professional network will serve to provide an exceptional grasp of the therapeutic opportunities as we execute on our strategy for Eleven to bring important treatments to patients with ocular disease.”
Dr. Gertz is a venture partner at Clarus Ventures and Chief Medical Advisor for Relay Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a Clarus-backed development company. Prior to joining Clarus, Dr. Gertz was Senior Vice President of Global Clinical Development at Merck. With 28 years of experience in drug development, he was responsible for overseeing all aspects of Merck’s clinical research from exploratory clinical pharmacology to global Phase 3 trials and life cycle management. He was instrumental in the development and approval of more than 25 new drugs and vaccines, including six new approvals in 2014 as well as the blockbuster products Fosamax® and Januvia®. Dr. Gertz holds MD, PhD, and BA degrees from the University of Pennsylvania. He trained in internal medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and held fellowship and faculty positions at UCSF.
Dr. Duker is an internationally recognized vitreoretinal surgeon, and serves as professor and chair of Ophthalmology at Tufts University School of Medicine and director of the New England Eye Center. He is co-author of the fourth edition of the medical text, Ophthalmology. Dr. Duker specializes in medical and surgical diseases of the posterior segment, and he is best known for his contributions to the field of optical coherence tomography (OCT) to diagnose and manage retinal diseases. He has directed several clinical trials at the New England Eye Center. Dr. Dukercompleted his medical studies at the Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University, followed by a fellowship in Vitreoretinal Diseases and Surgery and Intraocular Tumors at Wills Eye Hospital.
About Eleven Biotherapeutics
Eleven Biotherapeutics, Inc. is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company with a proprietary protein engineering platform, called AMP-Rx, that it applies to the discovery and development of protein therapeutics to treat diseases of the eye. The Company’s therapeutic approach is based on the role of cytokines in diseases of the eye, the Company’s understanding of the structural biology of cytokines and the Company’s ability to rationally design and engineer proteins to modulate the effects of cytokines. Cytokines are cell signaling molecules found in the body that can have important inflammatory effects.
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