Glenn Pierce, M.D., Ph.D., joined the Be Biopharma Scientific Advisory Board in June 2023. Dr. Pierce is a globally renowned physician-researcher, tireless patient advocate, hemophilia survivor and deeply respected hematology thought leader who has dedicated decades of his distinguished career to improving the lives of people living with bleeding disorders, their caregivers and families. His expertise is in the areas of tissue regeneration and hematology, including hemophilia, he has been involved in the development and market approval of six therapies for hemophilia.

Dr. Pierce has more than 30 years of experience in bench-to-bedside research and development with several public and private biopharmaceutical companies, including Biogen, Bayer, Inspiration, Avigen, Selective Genetics, and Amgen. At Biogen, Dr. Pierce served as senior vice president of hematology, cell and gene therapies, with overall R&D responsibility for hemophilia and hemoglobinopathies and led the research and clinical development of extended half-life FVIII (Factor VIII) and FIX (Factor IX) Fc fusions. He joined Biogen as chief medical officer in 2009 and was also responsible for global medical affairs for Biogen’s portfolio. He co-founded Ambys Medicines, a cell and gene therapy liver regeneration start-up, where he served as chief medical officer and most recently served as interim CSO of Voyager Therapeutics, where he serves on the board of directors. 

Dr. Pierce currently serves as vice president, medical, with the World Federation of Hemophilia (WFH). With the National Bleeding Disorders (previously the National Hemophilia Foundation), he serves as a member of the U.S. medical and scientific advisory council, and previously served as a member of the board of directors and as board president. Dr. Pierce spearheaded the initiation of the expanded WFH humanitarian aid program providing clotting factor distribution. He also led the initiation of the My Life Our Future (MLOF) program to genotype more than 10,000 individuals in the U.S. bleeding disorder community. He is an entrepreneur-in-residence at Third Rock Ventures as well as a consultant for several gene therapy and hematology biotech companies.

The co-author of more than 200 scientific papers, Dr. Pierce has been awarded over 15 patents. Dr. Pierce also served on the Blood Products Advisory Committee of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Committee on Blood Safety and Availability for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He received his M.D. and Ph.D. in immunology from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio and did his postgraduate training in pathology and hematology research at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.

Dr. Pierce was born with severe hemophilia A and was cured in 2008.

Stephen Gottschalk, M.D., is the Chair of the Department of Bone Marrow Transplantation and Cellular Therapy at St Jude Children’s Research Hospital. Dr. Gottschalk is leading a team of MD and PhD researchers, who are actively conducting clinical studies with antigen-specific T cells for patients with hematological malignancies, brain and solid tumors. His research areas of interest are cancer immunotherapy, cell therapy and stem cell transplantation. In the laboratory, his team is focused on using genetic approaches to improve T-cell therapy for cancer. Prior to joining St Jude’s in 2017, he was a Professor at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy at Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor College of Medicine. Dr. Gottschalk earned an M.D. from Georg August University, Göttingen, Germany, and completed his internship in pediatric medicine at the University of Münster, Germany. He subsequently completed a residency in pediatrics and a fellowship in pediatric hematology-oncology at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas. For his contributions to the fields of pediatric hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and cell-based immunotherapies he was elected into the American Society of Clinical Investigation in 2015.

Paula Cannon, Ph.D. is a Distinguished Professor of Molecular Microbiology and Immunology at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California. Dr. Cannon’s background as a virologist studying HIV and other RNA viruses led to an interest in how viruses could be exploited as gene therapy vectors. More recently, her lab has focused on the use of gene editing tools such as zinc finger nucleases and CRISPR/Cas9 to engineer blood and immune cells.  A significant area of interest is how such tools could be used to address chronic conditions including HIV. Her lab was the first to demonstrate that gene editing could be harnessed to knock out the HIV co-receptor molecule, CCR5, and thereby create an HIV resistant immune system. Pre-clinical studies in humanized mice supported subsequent clinical trials in people living with HIV. More recently her lab has made advances engineering B cells to express customizable antibodies and non-antibody molecules, in a way that could take advantage of the natural response of B cells to vaccination.

Dr. Cannon is highly regarded as a gene and cell therapist. In 2024-2025, she will become the President of the American Society for Gene and Cell Therapy, which is the largest professional organization for academic and industry scientists working in this area of medicine.