Scientific Advisory Board

Gordon B. Mills, MD, PhD, was recruited to The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in 1994, where he holds the rank of Professor with joint appointments in Systems Biology, Breast Medical Oncology and Immunology; serves as chairman of the Department of Systems Biology; holds the Wiess Distinguished University Chair in Cancer Medicine. Dr. Mills founded the Department of Systems Biology at the MD Anderson Cancer Center, the first Cancer Systems Biology Department and the second Systems Biology Department in the US. Dr. Mills is Director of the Kleberg Center for Molecular Markers; co Director of the Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy and the Women’s Cancer Moonshot. The Center and the Institute are responsible for developing and implementing personalized molecular medicine at MDACC. The Women’s Cancer Moonshot is responsible for transforming outcomes for these patients with breast and ovarian cancer. Dr. Mills currently serves as principal investigator or project investigator on many national peer review grants including Stand Up To Cancer, NIH/NCI SPOREs U24 and PPGs, Department of Defense, CPRIT and Komen Foundation grants, and is a collaborator on multiple other national grants. He currently sits on the scientific advisory boards of multiple companies and venture capital groups. He has recently been awarded the Komen Brinker award for Scientific Excellence and the Stand up to Cancer Laura Ziskin Prize for mentoring.

Dr. Levine is the Director of the Division of Gynecologic Oncology at the Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Cancer Center and the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at NYU Langone Center in New York City. Prior to joining NYU Langone Center in May of 2016, Dr. Levine had a distinguished career at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where he served as an attending physician and head of the Gynecology Research Laboratory. Dr. Levine earned his medical doctorate in 1995 at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, NY, where he also completed a residency in obstetrics and gynecology. He went on to a clinical fellowship in gynecologic oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering and then spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory, also at Memorial. In addition to a clinical practice, Dr. Levine is the current Head of the Gynecology Research Laboratory at Memorial, where he studies the genomic science of ovarian and endometrial carcinoma.

Dr. Parkinson is a Venture Partner at New Enterprise Associates. From 2007 until 2012, Dr. Parkinson previously served as President and CEO of Nodality, a South San Francisco-based biotechnology company focused on the biological characterization of signaling pathways in patients with malignancy to enable more effective therapeutics development and clinical decision-making. Until October 2007 Dr. Parkinson was Senior Vice President, Oncology Research and Development, at Biogen Idec. At Biogen Idec he oversaw all oncology discovery research efforts and the development of the oncology pipeline. Previously he had served as Vice President, Oncology Development, at Amgen and Vice President, Global Clinical Oncology Development, at Novartis. During his tenures at Amgen and Novartis, Dr. Parkinson was responsible for clinical development activities leading to a series of successful global drug registrations for important cancer therapeutics, including Gleevec, Femara, Zometa, Kepivance, and Vectibix.

Dr. Strome has been a Co-Chairman of the Medical Advisory Board at Medrobotics Corporation since November 5, 2012. Dr. Strome has spent most of his academic career at Harvard Medical School, heading Otolaryngology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and at the Cleveland Clinic as Professor and Chairman of the Clinic’s Head and Neck Institute. Under his leadership, the Clinic’s program attained recognition as one of the elite programs worldwide in the treatment of head and neck cancers.

Dr. Chang, the Founder, CEO and Chairman of Tanox, a successful US based Biotechnology Company known for its strong drug development capabilities and track record. Dr. Chang is currently the President of Apex Enterprise Inc., an investment management firm with focus on healthcare investments. Dr. Chang is also an adjunct professor at the Departments of Medicine and Genetics at Baylor College of Medicine.

Dr. Chang was born in Taiwan. She received her Ph.D. from the Division of Medical Sciences of Harvard University in 1979. After graduation, Dr. Chang worked at the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology and was a member of the team who conducted pioneering research on recombinant alpha and beta interferons. Dr. Chang subsequently joined Centocor (now a Division of Johnson and Johnson) where she held several leadership positions in the development of antibody based diagnostic and therapeutic products. Dr. Chang is known for her pioneering research and development efforts in the HIV field.

In 1986, Dr. Chang joined Baylor College of Medicine as an Associate Professor at the Department of Virology and later she founded Tanox, Inc. Tanox successfully developed the breakthrough drug Xolair which was first approved by the US FDA in 2003 for treating patients with moderate to severe asthma. Now Xolair is also approved for treating atopic dermatitis and allergy in more than 30 countries worldwide. In addition to Xolair, four of Tanox products in the pipeline are now in late stage clinical development with promising results for treating patients with diseases including allergy, atopic dermatitis, HIV infection and age Macular degeneration, etc. Tanox was acquired by Genentech in 2007 for USD $919 million.

Dr. Chang has served on the board of directors of several enterprises including: the Federal Reserve Bank in Houston, Project Hope, BioHouston, Charles River Laboratories, the Board of Visitors of the University of Texas, M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and the Asia Society. Her scientific publication includes over 35 papers at peers reviewed journals including Nature and Science on topics including monoclonal antibodies and HIV. She has also been awarded nine patents including the first US patent in the HIV field.