People

Dr Susan Foden – Non-Executive Chairman

Dr Susan Foden holds a number of Non-Executive Directorships with both public and private companies and public funding bodies in the biotech and healthcare field, including Vectura plc, Source Bioscience plc, Rainbow Seed Fund and Cascade Ltd, Oxford Ancestors Ltd. Prior to this Susan held positions in venture capital and UK biotech companies. From 2000 to 2003 she was an Investor Director with the London-based venture capital firm Merlin Biosciences Limited, and was Chief Executive Officer of the technology transfer company Cancer Research Campaign Technology Ltd from 1987 to 2000. She is also a Member of the Advisory Board for Elara GmbH, University of Manchester Premier Fund, Endeavour Capital and the Centre of Drug Discovery and Development at the University of Leuven, Belgium. She studied biochemistry at the University of Oxford from where she obtained an MA and a DPhil.

sue.foden@cizzlebiotech.co.uk

Dr John Lucas – Chief Executive Officer

Dr John Lucas brings over 12 years of experience in the biotechnology industry to Cizzle. Prior to joining Cizzle, he was General Counsel and Vice President of Intellectual Property at Silence Therapeutics, plc in London, UK. At Silence he was responsible for a wide range of legal and business matters and played a key role in the corporate transaction with Intradigm Corporation. Prior to Silence, John was Vice President of Intellectual Property at Metabasis Therapeutics, a biopharmaceutical company in La Jolla, California. John also held the position of Vice President, Intellectual Property at Transform Pharmaceuticals of Lexington Massachusetts, a company specializing in small molecule drug form and formulation. John further served as Vice President, World-wide Intellectual Property at Genset of Paris, France and San Diego, California and as Patent Examiner with the United States Patent and Trademark Office. John holds a law degree (JD) from George Washington University and a PhD in molecular genetics from The Ohio State University. He also holds a MS in microbiology and a BEd from Ohio University. In addition to his graduate studies, John’s scientific experience includes a post-doctoral fellowship in cancer research at the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland.

john.lucas@cizzlebiotech.co.uk

Dr Dawn Coverley – Chief Scientific Officer and founder

Dawn Coverley is a cell biologist with 20 years experience in basic cancer-related research. After a first degree in Genetics (Leicester), and a PhD in biochemistry (Cancer Research UK), she moved to Cambridge University in 1992. Her research exploits experimental systems that reconstitute fundamental process associated with DNA metabolism, including DNA repair and DNA replication, and has generated original research articles published in peer review journals including Nature and Nature Cell Biology. In 2001 she was awarded a senior research fellowship by the Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine and established a new research laboratory at the University of York. She founded Cizzle Biotech in 2005, and raised seed corn funding in 2006. She is currently principal investigator of an academic DNA replication research laboratory at York and Chief Scientific Officer of Cizzle.

dawn.coverley@cizzlebiotech.co.uk

Michael Slade - Financial Controller & Company Secretary

Michael is a Chartered Accountant and a member of the Institute of Indirect Taxation. He heads up a small team within the Finance Department of the University of York, which provides accounting, taxation and company secretarial services to a wide portfolio of small and medium sized companies associated with the University. Additionally, he has responsibility for the University's VAT and corporation tax affairs. He began his career with what is now KPMG and then worked for a number of major companies in the region before joining the University.

michael.slade@cizzlebiotech.co.uk

Dr David Milroy (Observer to the board)

Dr David Milroy joined the private equity team at Aberdeen Asset Management PLC in 2007 and was part of the team that formed Maven Capital Partners in June 2009, via a management buyout of AAM's private equity business. David is responsible for the White Rose Seed Fund and Maven's portfolio of technology companies. David serves on the Board of PLM Helicopters, Essential Viewing Systems and Asterion and is an observer on the Board of several other portfolio companies. He holds PhD, MBA and BSc(Hons) degrees from Bath, Edinburgh and Aberdeen Universities respectively.

david.milroy@cizzlebiotech.co.uk

Professor P.J. Guillou (Observer to the board)

Pierre Guillou is Emeritus Professor of Surgery in the University of Leeds. He is a member of the Council of Management of Yorkshire Cancer Research and sits on YCR’s Clinical and Commercial Development Committee. Previous appointments in addition to the Chair in Surgery of the University of Leeds include Deanship of the Faculty of medicine in the University of Leeds and prior to this he was the Professor of Surgery at Imperial College in St Mary’s Hospital Medical School, London. His clinical activities were in the field of gastrointestinal cancers, particularly colorectal and pancreatic cancers. His research interests revolve around the molecular biology of gastrointestinal cancers and minimal access and robotic surgery for colorectal cancer. Over many years he has served on a number of  Medical Research Council research funding Boards including the MRC’s Molecular and Cellular Medicine Board, Public Health and Health Services Research Board, and the Efficacy and Mechanism Evaluation Board.  For some years he also served on the Clinical Research Board of Cancer research UK as well as a number of national and international advisory committees for research development. He was for ten years an Editor of the “British Journal of Surgery”, and was foundation Editor of two international Journals, “Surgical Oncology” and the “International Journal of Robotic and Computer-assisted Surgery” and has been on the Editorial Boards of a number of international journals.  He has over 200 peer-reviewed reports and research publications in the fields of cancer research, surgical gastroenterology and minimal-access surgery and is the co-author of a number of books in these areas.

Gillian Higgins - Research Staff

Gillian Higgins graduated in Microbiology from Liverpool University in 1986. She worked in public health and hospital labs for twelve years until 1998 when she began work in the Biology department at the University of York.  She gained a PhD in the area of plant molecular biology in 2007 and in 2009 was awarded a Yorkshire Enterprise Fellowship. She joined the Coverley group in 2009. Gillian undertakes Cizzle research work including the development and application of Ciz1 splice variant selective molecular tools.

Cizzle Biotech
Heslington Hall, Heslington, York, North Yorkshire, Y010 5DD
UK company 5249093