Our Scientific Council

Isabelle Rivière received her PhD in cellular and molecular biology from the University of Paris. She began her graduate studies at the Institut Curie in Paris and completed her thesis at the Whitehead Institute in Cambridge, MA. She developed retroviral vectors (MFG/SFG) for long-term in vivo expression of transgenes in hematopoietic cells, which are widely used in clinical studies worldwide. After a post-doctoral fellowship at NYU, she joined Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in 1999 where she focused on the development of novel strategies for cell and immunotherapies. Her laboratory investigates genetic approaches to enhance/correct various cell types, including T cells and stem cells, for the treatment of cancers and genetic hematological disorders. Over the past 20 years, she has designed and implemented multiple cell bioproduction processes for several Phase I/II clinical trials. Her laboratory has initiated several clinical trials based on CAR-T cells for the treatment of hematological malignancies and solid tumors. She also studies the immunological functions of CAR-T cells in clinical trials and animal models. She actually is Vice President, Head of Oncology Cell Therapy Technologies and Product Engine at TAKEDA, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.

Pediatrician, Professor of Hematology since 2000, Director of the Department of Biotherapy at Necker Hospital, University of Paris. She is director of the Inserm / Assistance Publique - Hôpitaux de Paris GHU Ouest Clinical Investigation Center in Biotherapy and works with the "Human Lymphohematopoiesis" research laboratory of the Imagine Institute.
Her main clinical and research interests are the development of the hematopoietic immune system, and cell and gene therapy for inherited and acquired diseases of the hematopoietic system. She has initiated several clinical trials based on the use of ex vivo gene-modified hematopoietic stem cells to treat patients with inherited diseases, with encouraging preliminary clinical results.
Her work has been recognized by the American Society of Hematology (Clinical Research Award in Gene Therapy in 1999 and Ernest Beutler Lecture in 2017), the French Academy of Sciences (Special Prize in Medicine in 2000 and the Jean-Pierre Lecocq Prize in Gene Therapy in 2004). She received the 2012 Irène Joliot Curie "Women Scientists of the Year" award (French Academy of Sciences and French Ministry of Education and Research).

President of the company ASTRAVEUS, created in 2016 during his thesis prepared under the supervision of Professor Jérôme Larghero at the Saint-Louis Hospital, and focusing on the use of microfluidics for the production of biotherapies. The Astraveus team is now working with the MEARY Center team to provide high performance automated microfluidic solutions for the production of biotherapies. Jérémie is a polytechnic engineer and a graduate in biomedical engineering from Paris-Descartes University.

Professor at the Faculty of Pharmacy (Department of Health Products and Public Health) of the University of Paris-Descartes and at the Central Pharmacy (Department of Pharmaceutical Innovation) of the Assistance Publique -Hôpitaux de Paris, he has been in charge from 1987 to 2014, of various functions for the French and European health authorities, in the evaluation of drugs and more particularly of biological drugs and biotechnologies. He was Director of the evaluation of drugs and biological products at the French Agency for Health Products Safety (Afssaps) from 2001 to 2007. At the European level, he was the chairman of the European Working Group on Biotechnology (BWP). At the creation of the European Medicines Agency, he was appointed French representative to the Committee for Proprietary Medicinal Products (CHMP) and to the Committee for Advanced Therapies (CAT). He participated in the implementation of the regulation of gene therapy, cell therapy and tissue engineering drugs (advanced therapy medicinal products -ATMP).

Cardiac surgeon at the Georges Pompidou European Hospital (University of Paris) and co-leader of an INSERM team dedicated to cell therapy of cardiac and vascular pathologies. The group has been working for many years on cell therapy of heart failure in collaboration with Prof. Larghero and his team of the cell therapy unit of the Saint-Louis Hospital and the MEARY Center. This led to the first transplants of muscle stem cells (2000) and then of cardiac cells derived from human embryonic stem cells associated with a biomaterial (2014). In parallel, thanks to the animal models in place in the laboratory, the team is working on the characterization and production of the cardiac cell secretome, which seems to reproduce the effect of the cells on the activation of endogenous repair pathways, with the main goal of simplifying the technical, logistical and economic problems related to the transplantation of the cells themselves.

A hematologist at the Saint-Louis Hospital and professor of hematology at the University of Paris. He is in charge of the Adolescent and Young Adult Hematology Unit (AJA) which welcomes young patients aged 15 to 25 years with hematological diseases such as acute leukemia, lymphoma or medullary aplasia. He chairs the Adolescent and Young Adult Oncohaematology Group (Go-AJA) which brings together all the health professionals involved in the overall care of these young patients. In the field of research, he is interested in the characterization of acute leukemias which contributes to their better understanding and prognostic stratification. In the therapeutic field, he is involved in numerous protocols aiming to improve the outcome of patients with acute leukemia, in the field of targeted therapies and immunotherapy, mainly bispecific antibodies and CAR-T cells.

Head of the Medical Oncology Department at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris.
He is also head of the early phase clinical trials department "CLIP² Galilée", dedicated to "rare cancer patients", in connection with the IUC/University of the Sorbonne.
He is in charge of the French Rare Cancer Group, CANCERVIH, dedicated to HIV positive patients with cancer, supported by INCa. He also works at INSERM, Unit 1136 (Institut Pierre Louis d'Epidémiologie et de Santé Publique), dedicated to the epidemiology and treatment of HIV, in France, directed by Dominique Costagliola.
President (honorary) of the Association of Oncology Fellows (AERIO) in France, which he founded in 1996, he is also a member of several oncology societies, including the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO), the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), and the International Society of Geriatric Oncology (ISOG).

He is an anesthesiologist and head of the Surgical Intensive Care Unit at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris. He is also a research associate at the INSERM UMRS 959 Immunology - Immunopathology - Immunotherapy unit (i3). His research focuses on the development of immunomodulatory therapies in acute pulmonary inflammation. From 2012 to 2014 he worked as a research associate in the units of Michael Matthay and Jae Woo Lee in San Francisco (UCSF), evaluating the efficacy of mesenchymal stromal cell-derived extracellular vesicles in acute pulmonary inflammation. In 2020, he joined the French extracellular vesicle society, and coordinated 2 clinical trials in ARDS associated with SARS-CoV-2: STROMA-CoV-2 and LILIADE-COVID. The STROMA-CoV-2 trial used cells produced by the MEARY Center for Cell and Gene Therapy.

Philippe Marchessaux is an independent consultant. His areas of expertise are corporate strategy, economics, and asset management. He worked at BNP Paribas from 1987 to 2019 where he held multiple positions within the Asset Management branch before heading it in 2009: appointed Director and CEO of BNP Paribas Asset Management Holding, which he managed until the end of 2015, and Chairman of BNP Paribas Asset Management until 2016 he then devoted himself to an entrepreneurial project within the Group. He has served́ for BNP Paribas AM as Chairman of the Board or Director in France as well as in the USA, the UK, Canada and Europe. In addition, he chaired́ the Paris Europlace Institutional Investors Committee from 2015 to 2019. He is a graduaté of the Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC 1985) and the French Society of Financial Analysts and holds a degree in philosophy (Paris IV Sorbonne).

After studying medicine at the University of Paris Descartes, André Baruchel trained in pediatric hemato-oncology as a fellow at the Saint-Louis Hospital. He specialized in the field of pediatric leukemia, in both basic and clinical research. He leads the French acute lymphoblastic leukemia group (FRALLE). After the merger of 2 pediatric hematology departments at the Robert Debré Hospital, he turned his interest towards the field of innovative drugs and became a member of the executive committee of the ITCC (Innovative Therapies for Children with Cancer) consortium. In the last few years, he has been particularly interested in the field of CAR-T cells, Robert Debré being the first authorized center in pediatrics in France. He was a member of the International Membership Committee of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). He was also a member of the Data Safety Monitoring Committee of the Pediatric Oncology Group for 10 years.

Professor of Infectious Diseases at the University of Paris, and Head of the Infectious Diseases Department at Saint-Louis and Lariboisière Hospitals in Paris, France. The Infectious Diseases Department is primarily concerned with the care of immunocompromised patients, HIV-infected patients, bone marrow and kidney transplant recipients, and patients with hematological malignancies and cancers. Professor Molina's primary clinical research interest is in HIV infection, initially in the treatment of AIDS-related opportunistic infections and later in the treatment of HIV infection. He is also a member of the U944 team at the Institut national de la santé et de la recherche médicale (INSERM) at the Saint-Louis Hospital, which studies the cell biology of viral infections. Professor Molina is also involved in the French National Agency for AIDS Research (ANRS), where he chaired the clinical trials group for the past 12 years before becoming a member of the ANRS strategic committee.