To develop world-class drugs, HOX Therapeutics leadership has recruited a world-class team of advisors.
HOX Co-Founder and Non-Executive Director, Professor Richard Morgan Director of the Institute of Cancer Therapeutics (ICT) and Director of Research for the School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, University of Bradford. ICT houses a multidisciplinary team of researchers in target and biomarker discovery, drug design, synthesis, screening, and pharmacology.
In 1990, Prof Morgan graduated in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge. In 1993 he gained his doctorate in Biochemistry from the University of Birmingham. In the following years, he appointed was Postdoctoral Scientist, at MRC National Institute for Medical Research, London (1993-1997) and at the Hubrecht Laboratory for Developmental Biology, Utrecht, The Netherlands (1997-2000). Subsequently, he held the posts of Lecturer in Cell and Developmental Biology, at St George’s, University of London (2000-2006) and Senior Lecturer in Molecular Oncology, at the University of Surrey (2006-2014. In 2014 he became a Professor of Molecular Oncology at Bradford University and in February 2016 he accepted the Directorship of the prestigious Institute of Cancer Therapeutics. Professor Morgan’s group is working on the HOX project described above along with a number of other studies of new molecular targets in cancer.
HOX Co-Founder and Non-Executive Director, Professor Hardev S Pandha Medical oncologist and clinician scientist, Professor Pandha is Director of the Surrey Cancer Research Institute, and a consultant physician in medical oncology at St Luke’s Cancer Centre, Guildford, specialising in urological cancers.
Professor Pandha qualified as a doctor at the University of Birmingham and has trained in internal medicine and subsequently in medical oncology at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith Hospital. He spent four years in research at the CRUK labs at the Hammersmith to gain his Ph.D. in gene therapy, for which he was awarded the McElwain prize. He completed his training at Stanford University in the USA and the Royal Marsden Hospital in London. He was a consultant medical oncologist at the St Georges University of London in 2000 before his appointment as Professor of Medical Oncology at Surrey University in 2006. He has been the director of the Surrey Cancer Research Institute (SCRI) since 2014.
Professor Pandha specialises in the treatment of prostate, kidney, and bladder cancer, and advises a number of companies in early-phase clinical trials of experimental cancer treatments in these fields. As a full professor at the University of Surrey, he leads a group of 22 scientists, doctors, nurses, technicians, and research students. His research focuses on the development of new cancer biomarkers, new cancer therapies using the immune system (immunotherapy, cancer vaccines), live viruses (viral therapy), and small molecules. His group is particularly interested in the family of HOX genes, which normally control limb and organ growth in the embryo, but which drive cancer cell growth in adults. His team discovered the new test for prostate and bladder cancers, called EN2, a member of this HOX gene family, which is now undergoing final evaluation.
Professor Pandha has published over 200 scientific papers and contributed to 14 medical textbooks. He has been a member of advisory boards in the management of urological cancers and the editorial board of several medical journals.
Mohammad Asin PhD
University of Surrey
Dr. Mohammad Asim, a molecular biologist, has over fifteen years of experience studying the molecular mechanisms that lead to prostate cancer progression and failure of current therapies. His research has focused on understanding the role of androgen receptors in prostate cancer and is potentially vital in finding novel treatments for aggressive prostate cancer. He has a BSc in Botany, Chemistry, and Zoology from MJP Rohilkhand University, Bareilly, India, an MSc in Biotechnology from Hamdard University, New Delhi, India, and a Ph.D. thesis studying the role of signal transduction and transcriptional cofactors in the regulation of androgen receptor function in prostate cancer from Justus Liebig University, Germany.
Yusuf Humied Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge,
Professor David Spring. His research focus is on understanding and exploiting biological systems using organic synthesis. His main area of research includes biotherapeutics, peptides, synthesis and methodology, and antibiotics. He collaborates with chemical companies and academic groups around the world.
Hox Therapeutics 