Cedric Francois

Cedric Francois' primary areas of expertise are immunology and immune system mediated disease. Cedric Francois received his medical degree from the University of Leuven in Belgium and his Ph.D. in Physiology from the University of Louisville. Following postgraduate training in pediatric and transplant surgery, Dr. Francois was a member of the research team that performed the first successful hand transplantation and of the Louisville Face Transplant Team, whose work supported the first human face transplantation in Lyon, France in 2005. He has published numerous publications and is the principal author on the clinical report of the first four human hand transplantations. He is an inventor on many biotechnology patent applications, including all of Potentia's and Apellis' proprietary patent applications. Dr. Francois led Potentia to become the first group to test complement-inhibiting drug candidates for age-related macular degeneration, more than a year before the landmark reports in Science magazine. In May 2010, he joined Apellis as its Chief Executive Officer.