President's Message

January 2010

Scott Johnson, Myelin Repair Foundation President and Founder … waiting for a cure since 1976

New MRF Chief Scientific Officer

This month the Myelin Repair Foundation is gearing up for our 6th Annual Research Plan Review Meeting. By reviewing and revising our research plan each year, we can ensure that each project or experiment we fund continues to drive us toward getting a myelin repair treatment to market.

We are also excited to share with you a recent addition to our management team.

Senior pharmaceutical industry veteran Dr. Mike Gresser, Ph.D. is joining the MRF as Chief Scientific Officer. His expertise in academic and industry research and development makes him ideally suited to guide the MRF through the commercial development of our myelin repair discoveries.

Dr. Gresser holds a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Brandeis University. His career includes eight years on the faculty at Simon Fraser University in Burnby, British Columbia and 12 years in senior staff positions at the Merck Frost Center for Therapeutic Research.

In 2000, Dr. Gresser joined Amgen Inc. in Thousand Oaks, California, as Vice President Research for Inflammation, where he remained until April, 2006. For two years Dr. Gresser served as Head of Neuroscience Research as well as Inflammation Research. His team at Amgen worked on many molecular targets, introducing numerous small molecules, human antibodies, and other proteins into development. The work of Dr. Gresser and his team has led to three drugs coming to market.

Dr. Gresser has been a member of the MRF’s Drug Discovery Advisory Board (DDAG) since January 2008. The DDAG was formed to assist MRF management and Principal Investigators in prioritizing MRF's drug targets and developing industry-standard data packages for presentation to commercial partners for further drug development and clinical trials.

With our focus on a patient treatment outcome, it makes sense to have someone with Dr. Gresser’s outstanding credentials as a “drug maker” leading our scientific effort at this time. I am delighted that our work has developed to the point where we could attract someone with Dr. Gresser’s stature to join our team.

What a great start to 2010 -- I look forward to another productive and prosperous year for the Myelin Repair Foundation.

Scott Johnson
President