Catherine Priest

Dr. Catherine Priest is the Chief Development Officer at Neurona Therapeutics. Catherine was most recently the Vice President of Preclinical Development at Neurona. Prior to Neurona, she was a Senior Science Officer at the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), where she managed a grant portfolio of Translational and Clinical programs. Previously, Dr. Priest led the preclinical cellular therapeutics group at Geron Corporation, working on treatments for spinal cord injury, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. During that time, the company developed the first successful IND application for an embryonic stem cell-derived cellular therapeutic that was approved by the FDA for use in a clinical trial. Dr. Priest also managed a research group at Bayer Biotechnology and was an Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, where her lab focused on neuroendocrine modulation of behavior and neural circuitry. Dr. Priest received a Bachelor’s degree in Biology and Psychology from Kalamazoo College in Michigan, and a Ph.D. in Neuroanatomy and Cell Biology from the UCLA School of Medicine. She did postdoctoral training at Rockefeller University and Mt. Sinai Medical School.