Xiaoyan Chu, Ph.D.
Dr. Xiaoyan Chu is a Senior Principle Scientist in the Department of Pharmacokinetics,
Pharmacodynamics & Drug Metabolism (PPDM), Merck & Co. Inc. Rahway, NJ. She received
her Ph.D. from the Department of Molecular Pharmacokinetics, Graduate School of
Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Tokyo, Japan. After completing her post-doctoral
research at the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, College of Pharmacy, University of
Michigan, she joined the Department of PPDM at Merck & Co in 2001. She has over 30 original
publications in the area of membrane transporters and pharmacokinetics. Her main
responsibilities are to evaluate and establish new technologies to study the role of drug
transporters in drug disposition and drug-drug interactions, and to design transporter related
support strategies for drug discovery and development programs.
Jeff Krise, Ph.D.
Dr. Jeff Krise is currently an associate professor of pharmaceutical chemistry at the University of
Kansas. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in pharmacy from Duquesne University (1993).
He earned his PhD (with honors) from the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the
University of Kansas in 1998. Dr. Krise received postdoctoral training at Stanford University
School of Medicine from 1998 to 2001 in the Department of Biochemistry. In 2001 he began
his academic career at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the Division of Drug
Delivery and Disposition. In 2004 he moved to back to the University of Kansas in the
Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry. His laboratory investigates how small molecular
weight drugs distribute and localize in cells and how this influences therapeutic activity and
toxicity.
Gus R. Rosania, Ph.D .
Dr. Rosania is Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Michigan
College of Pharmacy. He obtained his B.S. degree from Stanford University and his PhD from
Harvard University. For more than a decade, his research group investigated the cellular
pharmacokinetics of small drug-like molecules, in search of subcellularly targeted, cell typespecific "Chemical Address Tags". This search culminated in the discovery of clofazimine, an
ancient FDA-approved antibiotic currently entering three phase II clinical trials for the treatment
of multidrug resistant tuberculosis. In animals and humans, long term clofazimine
bioaccumulation is mediated by one of the most extraordinary, site-directed xenobiotic
sequestration mechanisms ever discovered.
Thomas A. Baillie, Ph.D., D.Sc.
Dr. Thomas A. Baillie currently is Dean of the School of Pharmacy and Vice Provost for
Strategic Initiatives at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA. He was born in Scotland
and educated at the University of Glasgow, where he earned B.Sc. (Hons) and Ph.D. degrees in
Chemistry in 1970 and 1973, respectively. He also holds an M.Sc. degree in Biochemistry from
the University of London (1978) and was awarded the degree of D.Sc. in Chemistry from the
University of Glasgow in 1992.
Following postdoctoral research at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, Dr. Baillie
held successive faculty positions at the University of London (1975-78), University of California
San Francisco (1978-81), and University of Washington (1981-94). He then joined Merck
Research Laboratories in West Point, PA, where he was Global Vice President of Drug
Metabolism & Pharmacokinetics until 2008, when he returned to the University of Washington
to assume his present responsibilities.
Dr. Baillie’s research interests center on the application of mass spectrometry and allied
techniques to mechanistic studies on the metabolism of foreign compounds, with particular
emphasis on the generation of chemically-reactive, potentially toxic products of
biotransformation. He has co-authored over 200 peer-reviewed publications, serves on the
Advisory Boards of a number of journals and academic research centers, and acts as a consultant
to several companies in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. He was awarded a
Fogarty Senior International Fellowship from the NIH in 1988, was the recipient of the James R.
Gillette Award from the American Society for Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics
(2001), received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Isotope Society (2009)
and was the 2012 recipient of the Founder’s Award from the Chemical Toxicology Division of
the American Chemical Society. He has been elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of
Chemistry, the Japanese Society for the Study of Xenobiotics, and the American Chemical
Society.
Lisa Beebe, Ph.D.
Lisa Beebe is the Director for Preclinical Development at Celgene Avilomics Research, formerly
Avila Therapeutics, in Bedford, MA. She earned a PhD in Pharmacology from the University of
the Sciences in Philadelphia, and pursued postdoctoral training at the National Cancer Institute.
Her experience in industry began at Covance Laboratories, where she participated in the
characterization of transgenic mouse models for carcinogenicity assessment. She has continued
as a development toxicologist for both biologics and small molecules at Human Genome
Sciences and BiogenIdec, prior to joining Avila Therapeutics in March 2011.
Don Mager, Pharm.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Mager is an Associate Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University at Buffalo,
State University of New York (UB). He received his BS degree in Pharmacy from UB, followed
by the PharmD and PhD degrees. Prior to joining the faculty at UB, he completed two years of
post-doctoral training as an IRTA Fellow at the National Institute on Aging of the NIH, where he
continued to serve as a special volunteer from 2004 to 2010. Dr. Mager has served as a Visiting
Professor at the University Paris Descartes in January from 2007 – 2013. He currently serves on
the Clinical Pharmacology Advisory Committee to the FDA and the Editorial Advisory Boards
of Biopharmaceutics and Drug Disposition and Journal of Pharmacokinetics and
Pharmacodynamics. Dr. Mager also serves as an Associate Editor to a new open-access journal,
CPT:Pharmacometrics & Systems Pharmacology. He was elected as a Fellow to the American
College of Clinical Pharmacology and is President-Elect of the International Society of
Pharmacometrics. His research focuses on identifying molecular and physiological factors that
control the pharmacological properties of various drugs, with a focus on anti-cancer and
immunomodulatory agents. He has contributed to over 80 peer-reviewed publications.