Dr. Burris serves as president and chief medical officer of Sarah Cannon, as well as the executive director, drug development for the research institute. He is an associate of Tennessee Oncology, PLLC, where he practices medical oncology.

Dr. Burris’ clinical research career has focused on the development of new cancer agents with an emphasis on first in human therapies, having led the trials of many novel antibodies, small molecules, and chemotherapies now FDA approved, including ado-trastuzumab emtansine, everolimus, and gemcitabine. In 1997, he established in Nashville the first community based early phase drug development program, which grew into the Sarah Cannon Research Institute. He has authored over 400 publications and 700 abstracts. Sarah Cannon has now dosed over 350 first in human anticancer therapies and enrolls more than 3000 patients per year into clinical trials.

Dr Burris was recently elected president of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), a professional society representing over 40,000 cancer physicians and researchers globally. He also currently serves on the Board of ASCO’s Conquer Cancer Foundation. Additionally in 2014, Dr. Burris was selected by his peers as a Giant of Cancer Care for his achievements in drug development. Dr. Burris completed his undergraduate education at the United States Military Academy at West Point, his medical degree at the University of South Alabama, and his internal medicine residency and oncology fellowship at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. While in Texas, he also served as the Director of Clinical Research at The Institute for Drug Development of the Cancer Therapy and Research Center and The University of Texas Health Science Center. He attained the rank of lieutenant colonel in the US Army, and among his decorations, he was awarded a Meritorious Service Medal with oak leaf cluster for his service in Operation Joint Endeavor.

Dr. Peter A. Kiener is a venture partner within the life sciences team at ICG, a global leader in alternative asset management, and also serves as a biotech/biopharma consultant. Prior to this, he served as Chief Executive Officer of Cereius Inc., a developer of radiodiagnostics and radiotherapeutics for cancer, as CSO and Head of Research and Development at Sucampo Pharma Inc, a fully integrated biopharma company, and CSO of Ambryx Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of antibody-drug conjugates.

Earlier in his career, Dr. Kiener was President and Co-founder of Zyngenia Inc., an early-stage biopharmaceutical company.  He also held leadership roles of increasing responsibility over an eight year span at MedImmune LLC, the global biologics arm of AstraZeneca, including Executive Vice President and Global Head of Biologics Research and Development, Senior Vice President and Head of Global Research, and Vice President of Research.  Dr. Kiener previously worked on biologics for Bristol-Myers Squibb. He began his career at the University of North Texas/Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine, where he was an Assistant Professor, and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, where he was a Research Associate.  Dr. Kiener has served on the scientific advisory boards of KAI Pharmaceuticals Inc., Genocea Biosciences Inc., NKT Therapeutics Inc. and VLST Corporation. Dr. Kiener currently serves as Chairman of the Board of Managers of Resolve LLC, and is a member of the Board of Directors of Cue Pharma LLC, Pieris, and Lava Therapeutics.

He has published more than 120 papers in peer-reviewed journals and is an inventor on more than 40 patents and patent applications. Dr. Kiener earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Lancaster and a doctorate of philosophy in biochemistry from the University of Oxford.

Prof. Dane Wittrup attended the University of New Mexico as an undergraduate, graduating Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor’s in Chemical Engineering in June, 1984. Wittrup went on to attend the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, where he worked with Prof. James Bailey on flow cytometry and segregated modeling of recombinant populations of Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

After obtaining his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering with a minor in Biology in 1988, he spent a brief time working at Amgen before becoming an Assistant Professor of Chemical Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1989. He moved to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in September of 1999, where he is now the C.P. Dubbs Professor of Chemical Engineering and Biological Engineering, in addition to working with the Koch Institute as the Associate Director for Engineering.