David Fajgenbaum

David is an Assistant Professor of Translational Medicine and Human Genetics at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, Founding Director of the Center for Cytokine Storm Treatment and Laboratory, and Associate Director of Patient Impact at the Penn Orphan Disease Center. He is Co-Founder and President of the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network (CDCN), a non-profit organization dedicated to accelerating research and treatment for Castleman disease and developing innovative processes to support and advance biomedical research to cure many more diseases. He described his journey to a precision treatment for his disease in his 2019 national bestselling memoir Chasing My Cure: A Doctor’s Race to Turn Hope Into Action. As a leading expert on cytokine storms and drug repurposing, David launched the CORONA Project in March 2020 to apply the models for drug repurposing and accelerating research for rare disease to finding new treatments for COVID-19. He is Co-director of the advisory committee for the CURE Drug Repurposing Collaboratory, which is a FDA/NIH/C-Path public-private partnership, and a Board Member of the Reagan-Udall Foundation for the FDA.