R. Jude Samulski

Richard Samulski, Ph.D. serves as the President of Chatham Therapeutics LLC. Samulski has been Scientific Co-Founder of Asklepios Biopharmaceutical, Inc. since 2003 and served as its Chief Executive Officer. In 1993, Samulski co-founded an AAV-based gene therapy company Merlin. He also co-founded Applied Genetic Technologies Corporation in 1999. He also serves as a gene therapy consultant to the FDA. Through the UNC gene therapy center, Samulski has produced within an academic setting an FDA approved AAV clinical vector used to treat children with the neurological disorder of Canavan's disease. He serves as Professor of Pharmacology of The University of North Carolina. Samulski served at AAV for 25 years. Samulski has been Director of the University of North Carolina Gene Therapy Center for eight years. He serves as a Member of Scientific Advisory Board of Ceregene, Inc. He served at AAV biology as a Member of the scientific advisory board of Avigen, a new AAV research company. Samulski has over 20 patents filed or issued in the area of AAV vectors. Samulski served as a Member of the Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee (RAC), a committee tasked with assisting the FDA with approving or disapproving gene therapy clinical trials in the United States. Samulski is a recipient of the President's Distinguished Research Award from the University of Pittsburgh. He completed Post-Doctoral training at Princeton. Samulski's graduate work (1978-82) demonstrated the first use of AAV as a viral vector and culminated in the first US patent involving non-AAV genes inserted into AAV. Samulski received his PhD in Medical Microbiology and Immunology from the University of Florida and his research focuses on the study of the dependent parvovirus adeno-associated virus (AAV)