Robert R. Ruffolo

Dr. Ruffolo is the retired President of Research and Development and Corporate Senior Vice President of Wyeth Pharmaceuticals (now Pfizer) where he managed an R&D organization of 9,000 scientists with an annual budget in excess of $3 billion. Prior to that he spent 17 years at SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals (now GlaxoSmithKline) where he was Senior Vice President and Director of Biological Sciences Worldwide, and before that he spent six years at Eli Lilly Co. as Chairman of the Cardiovascular Research Committee. He was responsible for the discovery of carvedilol (Coreg/Dilatrend) which radically changed the treatment of congestive heart failure by markedly reducing mortality and hospitalization from this devastating disease. For this he was awarded the Discoverers Award by PhRMA. During his career, Dr. Ruffolo has overseen the discovery, development, regulatory approval and marketing of over 30 drugs. He has published over 500 full-length publications, edited 15 books, served as Editor-in-Chief of four international scientific journals and has been a member of the editorial boards of 29 international scientific journals. Dr. Ruffolo currently serves on the boards of directors of Sigilon Therapeutics, Sapience Therapeutics, Elucida Oncology, Elicio Therapeutics, Lipido Pharmaceuticals, LB Pharmaceuticals, Aridis Pharmaceuticals, GVK Bio, and eXIthera Therapeutics. He received both a B.S. degree in Pharmacy and a Ph.D. in Pharmacology from The Ohio State University.