Advisors

Michele M. Hooper, MD, MS – Medical Safety

Dr. Michele Hooper, MD is a graduate of McGill University Medical School   

  • Had a distinguished career as Vice President of Medical Safety at Gilead for the new class of CAR-T cancer immunotherapies.
  • Held positions of increasing responsibility up to the level of Executive Medical Director at Amgen.
  • Managed product Safety in Inflammation, Oncology and Clinical Development for product such as Enbrel.
  • Provided strategic direction for benefit risk assessment of Phase 2, 3 and 4 products including Regulatory Filing activities.
  • Co-chaired Global Regulatory and Safety Policy Expert Review Group responsible for drafting corporate responses to regulatory agencies, legislative policies and conducted due diligence for mergers and acquisitions at Amgen.

Dr. Hooper’s areas of expertise include

  • Pharmacovigilance and Pharmacoepidemiology
  • Clinical trial Development
  • Medical Affairs

Dr. Hooper’s Academic career was in Rheumatology, where she championed new concepts of psoriasis as a systemic inflammatory disease and designed multipronged study with the Mayo Clinic to assess heart disease in psoriasis.  At Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, Dr. Hooper was a member of the University Hospital’s Institutional Review Board. Earlier she was an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Clinical Associate Professor of Orthopedics, Clinical Program and Clinical Trials Unit Director, Division of Allergy, Immunology and Rheumatology with experience in Private Rheumatology Practice, Rochester, NY. Dr. Hooper’s Board Certifications include Rheumatology at the University of Virginia,  Allergy/Immunology at the University of Rochester, residency at Rochester General Hospital and intern at St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, Canada. She is a member of the American College of Rheumatology and Drug Information Association and author of 28 peer reviewed publications, 2 book chapters and numerous abstracts.


James Kelleher is a graduate of UMass, Boston, The Wharton School of Advanced Executive Education and St. John’s University School of Law. recently retired as Chief Legal Officer at Liberty Mutual Insurance. In that capacity he

  • Was an advisor to senior executives, CEOs, and Liberty Mutual Holding Company board members
  • Adeptly distilled and translated complex legal aspects into a business case for growth, resiliency and impact.
  • Leveraged 40 years of experience in the highly regulated property & casualty industry with specific expertise in risk assessment, ESG, US and global insurance regulation, major litigation, M&A, investments, and finance.
  • Is a deeply experienced corporate and not-for-profit board director who respects the boundary between board and management and views challenges from all stakeholders’ perspectives, drives consensus through thoughtfulness and honesty.

James Kelleher is a multidimensional problem-solver who easily pivots between corporate, litigation, and public policy matters with an understanding of key drivers and stakeholder perspectives around the world. Able to build and unify diverse, world-class teams with cultures of high performance, integrity, and giving back. Community champion who encourages others to use their expertise to become torchbearers for causes close to their hearts.

Dale A. Monceaux – Fermentation Process

Dale A. Monceaux is a leading ethanol technologist with more than 35 years experience in process technology development and plant design, construction, commissioning, startup and operations in petrochemical and renewable fuels. He founded AdvanceBio, LLC – a renewable energy and chemicals firm, and In his prior role as Sr. Vice President for Katzen International, Inc., Dale resolved numerous process engineering problems for grain ethanol production facilities.

Dale Monceaux has

  • Developed advanced enzymatic hydrolysis, fermentation, distillation and separation processes commercially applied in corn, wheat, barley based dry-mill fuel ethanol facilities as well as starch slurry, cassava, cane sugar and molasses plants with production capacities up to 100 million gallons per year.
  • Consulted on a broad range technologies related to conventional feedstock (starch and sugar based) as well as biomass (lignocellulosic) based biofuels and biochemical projects.
  • Technology development and design activities include notable developments in the areas of
    • 2nd Generation Ethanol projects
    • pretreated biomass liquefaction
    • large-scale fermentation system design and management
    • fermentation organism nutrient optimization
    • stillage processing

Phillip R. Disher, MBA – Marketing Consultant

Phillip Disher is an innovative voice in the world of marketing whose creativity, unique experience and knowledge has contributed to the successful strategic development, management and execution of various national and international brand campaigns. He holds a MBA with a concentration in Business Analysis from Georgia State University and a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

His diverse, cross-industry experience includes high-profile projects with several of the world’s most recognized brands such as

  • Dow Chemical
  • United Nations Foundation
  • Coca-Cola
  • FIFA