Vice President, Oncology Research, OSI
Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
David M. Epstein joined OSI in 2006 and is Senior Vice
President, Oncology Research at (OSI) Pharmaceuticals where he is
responsible for preclinical discovery and translational
research. Prior to joining (OSI) Oncology, Dr. Epstein was a
principal founder of Archemix Corp (2001-2006) where he was Vice
President Biology and Head of Pharmacology with responsibility for
preclinical evaluation of aptamer therapeutic agents. While in
this capacity David’s efforts facilitated $101.75MM in venture
financing; leading the expansion of Archemix’ drug discovery
efforts and its focus on the discovery and development of aptamer
therapeutics used to treat cardiovascular, oncology and ophthalmic
diseases. He has over 10 years of leadership experience in
discovery research in both the pharmaceutical and biotechnology
industries; leading wide-ranging efforts in oncology drug discovery
at Bayer Pharmaceuticals (1999-2001), and at GPC Biotech (formerly
Mitotix, Inc., 1996-1999). Dr. Epstein is an inventor on numerous
patents in the development and use of aptamer therapeutics, nucleic
acid sensors derived from allosteric ribozymes, enzyme-based
syntheses of novel drugs, structure-based drug discovery for Cdc25
phosphatase, combinatorial protein libraries, and the development
of high-throughput screens against Cdc25-Cdk2/CyclinA. Through
his leadership experience, David has a strong and practiced
understanding of how to build corporate value through; product
discovery, development and out-licensing, through organic growth of
intellectual property, and through technology in-licensing. David
completed his postdoctoral fellowship (1992-1995) in structural
biology at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California,
leading a collaboration between the laboratories of Stephen
Benkovic (Pennsylvania State University) and Peter E. Wright in
protein NMR and enzyme mechanism and function. David received his
Ph.D. in 1991, from The Graduate Department of Biochemistry at
Brandeis University, in Waltham, Massachusetts and his B.Sc. in
Chemistry in 1981 from Lewis & Clark College, a liberal arts
college in Portland, Oregon.