Don Anderson & Caroline Vissers - Applying Hypoxia Biology

Dr. Don Anderson, PhD, MBA is Senior Scientist at Merck & Co., a multinational pharmaceutical company that develops and manufactures medicines in a broad range of therapeutic areas. Don previously worked at Peloton Therapeutics, which was acquired by Merck in May of 2019, primarily for its “novel small molecule therapeutic candidates targeting hypoxia-inducible factor-2α (HIF-2α) for the treatment of patients with cancer and other non-oncology diseases”. Dr. Caroline Vissers, PhD is a Principal Investigator at UCSF, where she operates a lab that examines the role of RNA methylation in neural development and stem cell behavior. Both guests were mentored by Nobel laureates - Don by Dr. Michael Brown (Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1985; cholesterol metabolism) during his postdoc and Caroline by Dr. Gregg Semenza (Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2019; oxygen sensing) - and navigated unique routes to their current roles. We explore the value of postdoctoral fellowships, why large biotech/pharma companies acquire smaller companies, how emerging insights into the biology of hypoxia are being translated into drugs, and the relationship between academia & industry.Hosted by Roshan Chikarmane and Jenna Glatzer.