Artugen Therapeutics applies rigorous pharmacologic principles to harness the microbiome’s therapeutic potential in difficult-to-treat infectious and inflammatory diseases that are modulated by the GI tract
Artugen is funded by Morningside Ventures and operated by Morningside BioPharma Advisory
Our Team
Artugen was founded in 2016 and has a discovery team based at University College Cork, Teagasc Food Research Centre, Moorepark, and APC Microbiome Ireland. Artugen’s development team is based in Concord, MA, USA
Scott Megaffin
Scott joined Artugen Therapeutics as Chief Executive Officer in January 2022, bringing more than 35 years of successful industry leadership, having held multiple senior executive, CEO and board director roles during his career at both Fortune 500 pharmaceutical and emerging biotechnology companies. Among Mr. Megaffin’s many career leadership roles, he previously served as the CEO of Adastra Pharmaceuticals Inc., a pioneer in the pursuit of better treatment options for high unmet need cancers, where he led the company from early informative to clinical-stage advancement of first-in-class clinical programs, and ultimately to its acquisition by Cothera Bioscience. Earlier, he served as a President of Churchill Pharmaceuticals, Inc., leading the organizational growth and development of a fully differentiated oral oncology asset for metastatic castrate resistant prostate cancer through FDA approval and ultimately a transaction to Sun Pharma. Mr. Megaffin has held numerous global strategic and operational positions of increasing responsibility within Onconova, Schering-Plough, Yamanouchi, Pharmacia, and Bristol-Myers Squibb. During his career Scott has led six global drug development programs resulting in regulatory approvals. He possesses far reaching knowledge in a broad number of therapeutic categories including oncology, anti-infectives, inflammation, pain, critical care, and virology. Mr. Megaffin currently serves as a board member of Adastra and on the Board of Directors for BioNJ, the biotechnology and life science organization of New Jersey. Mr. Megaffin holds a B.S. in Biology from Pittsburg State University.
Chris Stevens, MD
Dr. Stevens holds a BA in chemistry from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and an M.D. degree from the University of Miami in Florida. He has 10 years of academic research experience and over 20 years of biopharmaceutical drug development experience.
Dr. Stevens began his career as an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, Massachusetts where he led research in the field of mucosal immunology. Dr. Stevens left academia in 1998 to join Circe biomedical as its Medical Director developing a bioartificial liver. Following Circe he was Medical Director at Altus Pharmaceuticals developing liprotamase, a pancreatic enzyme replacement therapy. Since 2004 he has been an independent consultant for over 40 companies with a focus on drug development of therapies targeting gastrointestinal diseases, hereditary angioedema, infectious diseases, arthritis, diabetes, hepatitis and oncology. He has worked in all phases of drug development from pre-IND to NDA, BLA and MAA filing, orphan drug and fast track applications and FDA advisory committee presentations.
Most recently Dr. Stevens was the Chief Medical Officer for Arsanis, Inc from 2016 to 2019 overseeing the development of ASN100 for the prevention of bacterial pneumonia from preIND through to Phase 2. Dr. Stevens now serves as Artugen’s Chief Medical Officer.
Mustafa Noor, MD, FACP
Mustafa Noor, MD, FACP brings in 20+ years of industry experience in all phases of clinical development in both large and small companies. Dr. Noor had been a clinical development strategy consultant to emerging biotech’s in the Boston area. Prior to that he was Chief Development Officer at Akcea Therapeutics, and VP & TA head for endocrinology at IPSEN in Cambridge, MA responsible for the integrated activities of clinical development developing and overseeing a portfolio of antisense oligonucleotides and peptide therapeutics.
From 2006 to 2014 he was at GSK and at Pfizer where he served as vice president and clinical head for GSK’s Center of Excellence in External Drug Discovery (CEEDD) and for Pfizer’s Centers for Therapeutic Innovation (CTI) focusing on open innovation, translational research and collaboration with academic and biotech partners on a portfolio of programs in early phase trials.
Dr. Noor completed his undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Chicago and fellowship training in Endocrinology and Metabolism at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). He is certified in internal medicine and the subspecialty of endocrinology & metabolism and holds a Master’s Degree in clinical research from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. Dr. Noor now serves as Artugen’s Chief Medical Officer.
Dr. Ellie Hershberger, Pharm D
Dr. Hershberger now serves as Artugen’s clinical advisor.
Cheryl Cormier
In 2018, Cheryl joined Artugen Therapeutics as Operations Manager to set up the company’s operational infrastructure and to support its Chief Executive, Ronnie Farquhar.
Ronald Farquhar, D. Phil
Ronnie Farquhar joined Morningside Ventures in 2015 with almost 30 years of biopharma R&D experience. As an entrepreneur-in-residence, he was charged with the identification of innovative infection and immunity related investments. He subsequently became the Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Artugen Therapeutics Ltd., Bacainn Biotherapeutics, Ltd., ClearB Therapeutics Ltd. and Epsila Bio, Inc. and alongside an experienced management team, he has helped to guide these companies through discovery into clinical stage. Prior to Morningside, Dr. Farquhar was Senior Vice President, Discovery and Pharmaceutical Research at Cubist Pharmaceuticals where he oversaw the Company’s mission to identify novel antibacterials. During previous stages of his career, Ronnie served in senior roles at as Charles River Labs’ Preclinical Services, ActivBiotics, Inc., Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Pfizer Research. Approved products to which Ronnie has contributed include SelzentryTM(miraviroc) an anti-viral for the treatment of HIV and Zerbaxa® (ceftolozane/tazobactam) a cephalosporin antibacterial used for complicated and hospital acquired infection.
Dr. Farquhar holds a D. Phil. in microbial genetics from Oxford University, and BSc, microbiology from the University of Edinburgh.
Jason Dinges
Jason Dinges is the interim Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Artugen. He is a 10+ year veteran of the investment team of Morningside, Artugen ’s principal investor, with extensive experience working with private non-clinical and clinical stage companies developing drugs across a broad spectrum of therapeutic areas. Jason was previously an associate attorney at Foley & Lardner LLP, practicing intellectual property law in the firm’s Chemical, Biotechnology, and Pharmaceutical practice group. He received his Ph.D. in genetics from Iowa State University and a J.D., with highest distinction, from the University of Iowa College of Law.
Laurent Chesnel, PhD
In January 2018, Laurent joined Artugen Therapeutics as Senior Director of Research and Early Development leading the company’s transition to clinic.
Prof. Paul Ross
Paul was one of the founding shareholders in Artugen Therapeutics, serves on the Board of Directors and acts as a scientific consultant.
Prof. Colin Hill
Colin Hill has a Ph.D. in molecular microbiology and is a Professor of Microbiology at University College Cork, Ireland. His main interests are in infectious disease, bacteriocins and the gut virome. He is particularly interested in the role of the gut microbiome (bacteria , bacteriocins and bacteriophage) in protecting against microbial infections. He is also a Principal Investigator in APC Microbiome Ireland in Cork, a large Science Foundation Ireland supported research centre working with industry devoted to the study of the role of the gut microbiota in health and disease. In 2005 Prof. Hill was awarded a D.Sc. by the National University of Ireland in recognition of his contributions to research. In 2009 he was elected to the Royal Irish Academy and in 2010 he received the Metchnikoff Prize in Microbiology and was elected to the American Academy of Microbiology. He has published more than 550 papers and holds over 20 patents.
Prof. Hill was one of the founding shareholders in Artugen Therapeutics, he has served on the Board of Directors and acts as a scientific consultant.
Dr. Michelle O’ Donnell
Michelle joined APC Microbiome Ireland and Teagasc Food Research Centre, Moorepark as a Research Support Officer in 2016.
As part of the Cork-based discovery team, she oversees the research and development platform of Artugen Therapeutics.
Dr. James Hegarty
James Hegarty received a B.Sc. (Hons) in Microbiology from University College Cork in 2012, before completing a Ph.D. at Teagasc Food Research Centre in 2017. During this time his work focussed on the use of bacteriocin-producing microorganisms to treat obesity and related metabolic disorders. James successfully identified one lead isolate which became the subject of future studies.
In July 2018, James joined Artugen Therapeutics where he works as part of the Cork discovery team.
Mary Rea
Mary’s early research career was predominantly associated with dairy microbiology, encompassing work on the microbiota of cheese, the role of lactic acid bacteria in flavour development in dairy fermentations and food pathogens associated with dairy products. On the foundation of Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre (now known as the APC Microbiome Institute) Mary joined the Teagasc Team to mine the mammalian gut microbiota for antimicrobial producing bacteria targeting gut pathogens and their identification and purification with a specific focus on anti-Clostridium difficile antimicrobials. She was a funded investigator with APC with specific responsibility for the culture collections attached to Teagasc Food Research Centre and the APC which comprise of over 10,000 strains.
Mary joined Artugen Therapeutics Ltd at its foundation in 2016 as the senior microbiologist on the Teagasc based Artugen team. Since her retirement from Teagasc in 2018, Mary works as a consultant microbiologist with the Cork-based Artugen team.
Jennifer Locke
As the Chief Operating and Business Officer at Artugen Therapeutics, Jennifer serves as the key strategic leader overseeing both our business development and business operations divisions. She brings more than 15 years of experience in the biotech industry-leading high-performing teams, directing innovative development strategies, and executing operational excellence from early-stage drug discovery through NDA/BLA filing and into commercial launch. Prior to joining Artugen, Jennifer was the Senior Director Program Management at Seres Therapeutics where she ran the successful development of SER-109 for recurrent C. difficile into Phase 3, and SER-287 for ulcerative colitis into Phase 2 as well as the early-stage development of several other assets in the Seres’ portfolio. She has also held several leadership roles of increasing responsibilities at Merck and Cubist. Jennifer holds a Master of Science (M.S.) Project Management & Global Business from Boston University and a B.A. English, Spanish, and Women’s Studies from Fairfield University.
Ed Campanaro
Prior to entering the biopharmaceutical industry, Ed Campanaro held hospital positions as an ICU registered nurse at The Massachusetts General Hospital and later as a Captain in the U.S. Air Force. Ed holds an MS from The Georgetown University with a concentration in Clinical Research Administration, and a BSN from The University of Massachusetts-Boston.
Ed has more than three decades of drug development experience spanning multiple biopharmaceutical companies and various therapeutic areas. Prior to joining Artugen, Ed was Snr. Vice President of Clinical Operations at Arsanis, Inc. where he oversaw internal and external clinical operations, data management, statistics, and medical writing functions involved in the execution and analysis of a complex global Phase 2 ICU-based trial. Before joining Arsanis, Ed headed-up Clinical Operations and Data Management at bluebird bio, Inc. He also spent close to 15 years at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, where he led cross-functional teams through the successful execution and completion of global clinical development programs of novel antibiotics, leading to the successful marketing approvals for multiple acute-care products.
Ed joined Artugen in January 2020 as Senior Vice President and Head of Clinical Operations.
Emilton Rodrigues
Most recently, Emilton was the Senior Manager of Information Technology at Seres Therapeutics, a microbiome platform company. At Seres, Emilton had a similar role where he oversaw the architecture and implementation of the enterprise core infrastructure, network and security, and was the founding member of Information Technology Services.
As Director, Head of Information Technology at Artugen, Emilton oversees the architecture and implementation of all operational and business support systems and leads the Information Technology Department.
Bharat Dixit, PhD
Bharat has more than 15 years of experience in the biotechnology industry, with a focus in the areas of bioprocess & analytical development, as well as drug formulation including fill-finish, cGMP manufacturing, and project leadership. Bharat’s CMC expertise ranges from small molecules to complex biologics, vaccines and live biotherapeutics (microbiome). Prior to joining Artugen, Dr. Dixit led process and product development teams at Finch Therapeutics he successfully oversaw development and manufacturing for the company’s lead candidate, CP101, currently in late-stage clinical development for recurrent C. difficile infection (CDI). Prior to Finch, Bharat led teams at Gencoea Biosciences and Sanofi focused on development of several vaccine products.
Dr. Dixit earned his master’s degree in Life Science/Biotechnology from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee, and Ph.D. in biochemistry from the Institute of Microbial Technology (IMTECH), Chandigarh, India.
Shannon Foley
Shannon is the Senior Director, Head of Finance, of Artugen Therapeutics where she is responsible for financial planning and operations.
Ben Miller, PharmD
Benjamin Miller, PharmD, joined Artugen Therapeutics as Senior Director and Head of Clinical Research with over 10 years of research and development experience across diverse therapeutic areas, including rare diseases, nephrology, hematology, allergy/immunology and infectious disease. Prior to joining Artugen, Ben was most recently where he was responsible for Phase 4 evidence generation and life-cycle management planning and development for the marketed complement inhibitor SolirisÒ (eculizumab) as well as real-world data and launch support for UltomirisÒ (ravulizumab). Prior to this, Dr. Miller held various research and development roles of increasing responsibility at Shire, Merck and Cubist Pharmaceuticals and brings from early-stage development, through NDA, product launch and post marketing.
Ben received his Doctor of Pharmacy degree from Ohio Northern University and completed a postdoctoral industry fellowship in clinical research through Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences.
Our Mission
Artugen is committed to developing single strain Live Biotherapeutic Products to prevent and treat human diseases
Our Platform
Artugen has identified strains of Bacillus velezensis that uniquely deliver therapeutics benefits through multiple disease-targeting compounds in the gastrointestinal tract