NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Kallyope, Inc., a leading biotechnology company focused on identifying and developing therapies involving the gut-brain axis, today announced the promotion of Shirly PintoPh.D., to Scientific Director and the appointments of Jiajun Liu, Ph.D., as Vice President and Head of Biometrics and Michael Crutchlow, MD, as Vice President and Head of Translational Medicine .

“Shirly’s leadership and vision over the past five years has been instrumental in building a highly effective drug discovery organization that today has multiple programs in the clinic,” said Jay Galeota, President and CEO of Kallyope. “As a result, we are entering a new phase of expansion which requires new key hires. Jiajun and Mike strengthen our clinical development team and, together with Chief Medical Officer Dr. Brett Lauring, will help drive our continued progress. We look forward to utilizing their expertise and knowledge as we move our programs and trials forward. »

Shirly Pinto joined Kallyope in 2017, after 12 years at Merck & Co. where she established and executed scientific strategy across multiple therapeutic areas; she got her bachelor’s degree from New York University, her Ph.D. from the Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences/Cold Spring Harbor Labs, and his postdoctoral training at Rockefeller University. At Kallyope, she leads all aspects of drug discovery biology, including platform evolution and project initiation through lead optimization.

Jiajun Liu has 19 years of pharmaceutical experience, including 15 years as a biostatistician in late-stage clinical development, trial design and NDA/BLA submissions. Most recently, he was Vice President, Head of Biometrics at Gemini Therapeutics; previously he worked at Merck, Eli Lilly & Co., Biogen Inc. and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Liu graduated from North Carolina State University with a Ph.D. in the statistics.

Michael Crutchlow joins Kallyope after 15 years at Merck, where he most recently served as Executive Director, Late Stage Clinical Research – Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism, after holding positions in clinical pharmacology, experimental therapeutics and early drug development. clinical biologics. Dr. Crutchlow received his BS in Molecular Biology from Colgate University and his MD from Jefferson Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University, and was a resident at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. He then completed a fellowship in endocrinology and served as an adjunct assistant professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

About Kallyope

Kallyope, headquartered at the Alexandria Center® for Life Science in New York, is a biotechnology company dedicated to unlocking the therapeutic potential of the gut-brain axis. The company’s interdisciplinary team integrates cutting-edge technologies in sequencing, bioinformatics, neural imaging, cell and molecular biology, and human genetics to provide understanding of gut-brain biology that leads to transformational therapies for improve human health. The company’s founders are Charles Zuker, Ph.D., Lasker Prize winner Tom Maniatis, Ph.D., and Nobel Prize winner Richard Axel, MD. For more information, visit www.kallyope.com.