Martin Tolar, MD, PhD, President and Chief Executive Officer

Martin Tolar, MD, PhD, joined NormOxys as the company’s President and CEO in June 2009.  Previously, Dr. Tolar worked at CoMentis, Inc., where as the Chief Scientific Officer and later Executive Vice President & Chief Business Officer, he led the company’s scientific and business growth and negotiated a landmark collaboration agreement with Astellas Pharma for CoMentis’ beta secretase platform, a transaction valued at $760 million plus future commercial and next generation product milestones.

Prior to CoMentis, Dr. Tolar held a variety of leadership positions in Clinical Development, Strategic Partnerships and Business Development divisions at Pfizer, Inc.  He directed programs through all stages of clinical development and NDA submissions, and led the Pfizer Neuroscience Licensing Team to complete numerous business transactions including a record-breaking acquisition of Rinat Neurosciences (valued at $500 million) and license of the RAGE modulator platform from TransTech Pharma (valued at $155 million upfront plus development and commercial milestones).

Dr. Tolar holds an MD degree and was trained in Neurology at the Boston Medical Center, where he served as a Teaching Fellow in Neurology at the Boston University School of Medicine and as a Research Fellow at the Massachusetts General Hospital.  He received a PhD in Neuroscience for his work on the role of apolipoprotein E in Alzheimer’s disease.  Dr. Tolar has published a number of scientific publications in the area of Neuroscience and served as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at Yale University School of Medicine.

Dr. Tolar serves on the Board of Directors for Suven Life Sciences Ltd, a public biopharmaceutical company based in Hyderabad, India, focused on contract research and manufacturing as well as innovative drug development of novel first-in-class or best-in-class therapies through the use of GPCR targets.

Claude Nicolau, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer, Founder

Claude Nicolau, Ph.D (Berlin, Humboldt University , 1961) has worked and published on the modulation of regulated oxygen delivery by red blood cells since 1979. After demonstrating the beneficial physiological effects of low O2- affinity red blood cells in cardiac ailments, he developed a series of physical methods for the introduction into the red blood cell of non-permeant allosteric effectors of hemoglobin. Recently, these studies have been extended using a new, permeant allosteric effector of hemoglobin leading to remarkable therapeutic effects in preclinical models in such areas as congestive heart failure and cancer.

In the past Dr. Nicolau reported the first gene- transfer and expression in live animals and invented and developed the technique of protein electroinsertion in the plasma membrane of red blood cells.

Claude Nicolau has extensively published on the use of liposomes in many areas including gene transfer, targeted drug delivery and vaccines. He developed an anti-β amyloid vaccine and a monoclonal antibody against β-amyloid, which is in clinical trials.

Dr. Nicolau was a visiting Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School between 1991 and 2002 and is currently a visiting Professor at Tufts University. He has authored over 220 papers in peer-reviewed , scientific journals and was awarded over 50 patents. Claude Nicolau is the co- founder of Alantos, Inc., recently sold to Amgen, and of AC Immune (Lausanne, Switzerland) based upon his Alzheimer work.

David Clark, MD, MRCP, Chief Medical Officer

David Clark has over 12 years global pharmaceutical industry experience, having held a variety of leadership positions, primarily in the translational medicine field, in Europe and in the United States.  Prior to joining NormOxys as CMO, Dr. Clark led clinical teams, both in the exploratory development and full development phases and also multidisciplinary drug development teams while working in the Clinical Development dvision at Pfizer, Inc., in Connecticut from 2001 until 2009.  He has wide ranging drug development experience spanning preclinical through to Phase 4 programs, including NDA submissions.  These programs have covered six different therapeutic areas and included extensive interactions with regulatory authorities in the United States, European Union, and Japan.  Before Pfizer, Dr. Clark worked for SmithKline Beecham in their Clinical Pharmacology group in Harlow, Essex, and then for the Translational Medicine group for SmithKline Beecham and GlaxoSmithKline based at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, UK.

David Clark received his MD degree from the University of Edinburgh Medical School in 1987.  His postgraduate medical training in internal medicine was completed in Scotland and New Zealand and he is a Member of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP, UK).  Dr. Clark was a Research Fellow in Clinical Pharmacology in the UK and has published extensively in the Respiratory Clinical Pharmacology field.

John A. Hey, PhD, Senior Vice President, Preclinical and Early Development

Dr. Hey joins NormOxys from CoMentis where he served as Senior Vice President, Discovery and Preclinical Drug Development. There, he established a drug discovery and lead optimization facility comprised of a team of 25 scientists covering key aspects of early drug development, including: PK/PD, biochemistry, in vitro and in vivo pharmacology, in vitro and in vivo ADME, bioanalytical, preclinical safety, safety pharmacology, translational medicine, and medicinal chemistry. At CoMentis, he directed preclinical development for the beta secretase platform, as well as the technical and scientific due diligence efforts that led to the Astellas Pharma partnership, a transaction valued at $760 million plus future commercial and next generation product milestones. Prior to his four year tenure at CoMentis, Dr. Hey spent almost two decades at the Schering-Plough Research Institute in multiple roles of increasing responsibility leading discovery, preclinical and early clinical development teams through Phase II. During this period, he lead and managed the preclinical discovery, lead optimization and development activities of over 40 scientists. In this role he led multidisciplinary research operations -preclinical through early clinical development- and recommended and advanced over 15 NCE's into early development. Dr. Hey has a Ph.D. in Pharmacology and has authored of more than 140 peer reviewed publications.

Sara J. McKenzie, PhD, MBA, Vice President of Development Operations

Dr. McKenzie has over 20 years experience leading teams in the development of products for the medical community. She has been an Executive Program Director at Synta Pharmaceuticals, Critical Therapeutics, and Sepracor, where she was responsible for managing multiple drug development projects from the discovery stage through Phase III trials and NDA submissions. Indications ranged from heart disease and cancer to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, erectile dysfunction, urinary incontinence, and asthma. Her career has also included work in medical devices and protein-therapeutics at Genzyme, and vaccines and cancer diagnostics at Oncogene Science. Her expertise spans the range of experimental design, data analysis, manufacturing, clinical operations, and the business of science, all in the pursuit of improving the practice of medicine. Dr. McKenzie’s PhD is in biochemistry from the University of Kansas, and her MBA in General Management was earned at Simmons College Graduate School of Management.

Conrad Bletzer, Jr., Esq., General Counsel,Treasurer and Founder

Conrad J. Bletzer Jr. received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Boston College in 1977. He graduated from Boston College Law School in 1980 and later that year was admitted to the Massachusetts and Federal Bar. He is a practicing attorney.

Mr. Bletzer has been general counsel for several companies, the largest of which had sales in excess of $70 million last year and has provided corporate, contract, litigation and litigation assessment services to several others. His background in contracts, Intellectual property, litigation, finance and real estate allows him to give a broad perspective in providing corporate services. He has extensive experience in forming corporations, LLC's, limited and general partnerships, and trusts, and advising them with respect to their needs thereafter. He has extensive experience in finance, negotiating contracts, employment matters, and assessing litigation risk for companies. Mr. Bletzer has represented several venture capital entities and investors.