Board of Directors

Dr. Rashida A. Karmali, Founder, received her terminal degree, Ph.D in Biochemistry, from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1976. Prior to this she had received M.Sc. in Animal Nutrition from University of Aberdeen and B.S. in Biochemistry from Makerere University, located in Kampala, Uganda. She held a research position with the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City and a five year academic position as Associate Professor at Rutgers University in New Brunswick.  Her experience in the field of cancer research includes an extensive research program described in more than 100 publications, reviewing grants and publications for, among others, The Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) and The American Cancer Society (“ACS”). In addition, she was featured on the cover of Cancer Research in December of 1997 for recognition of her work involving cyclooxygenase- 2  (COX-2) in cancer.
               

She obtained her JD at the School of Law, Rutgers University, Newark, NJ and, runs a solo-Law Office on Wall Street, New York, since 2000.  She also has an MBA degree from Rutgers University, Newark, New Jersey.

Dr. Karmali discovered unexpectedly that a very promising drug, an angiogenesis inhibitor, that NCI had been testing for a long time and had to abandon because of its serious side effects in patients, could be modified chemically to achieve better bioavailability and efficacy and reduced preclinical toxicity.  Funding the initial research herself, she contracted the work to Southern Research Institute and Product Safety Labs to obtain data to support proof of principle.  She has since then sought funding from private investors and continued the development of the first drug candidate, CTO, on the Fast Track.  She relies on her Scientific Advisors at every step of the process.