Richard Peluso

Richard Peluso is a virologist with a Ph.D. from The Rockefeller University. After doing a post-doc at the University of California San Francisco and Vanderbilt University he was a faculty member with several medical schools (Thomas Jefferson University, University of Minnesota, Mt. Sinai School of Medicine) for 13 years where he taught medical and graduate students and ran an NIH-funded laboratory studying structure and function of human paramyxovirus glycoproteins and control of transcription and genome replication in a model rhabdovirus. He left academia in 1996 to work for a contract biosafety testing company than for two gene therapy companies with expertise in rAAV vectors (Genovo and Targeted Genetics) where he was Vice President of Process Sciences and Manufacturing. He joined Merck Vaccines in 2010 initially leading the analytical development group, then assumed responsibility and leadership for all vaccine Bioprocess Research and Development; he later added a similar role for Merck Biologics Bioprocess R&D. He retired from Merck as a Vice President at the end of 2018. Richard formed RWP BioConsulting, LLC at the beginning of 2019 to bring his expertise and experience to serve the life science industries. He currently sits on the Editorial Board for the publication Human Gene Therapy.

Dr. Peluso received his Ph.D. from The Rockefeller University in New York, and his B.A. in Biology from the University of Maryland Baltimore County.