Alan Korman, PhD, brings more than three decades of immunotherapy and biotechnology experience to his role as Chief Scientific Officer and Board Member at BlueSphere Bio. Prior to joining BlueSphere, he served as the Senior Vice President of Human Immunology at Vir Biotechnology. Before that, Dr. Korman was the Vice President of Immuno-Oncology Discovery at Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS). Earlier, he worked at Medarex in roles of increasing responsibility through to Vice President of Discovery Research. While at BMS and Medarex, Dr. Korman led the discovery of the immune checkpoint blockade approaches to cancer immune therapy. He directed the preclinical development of Yervoy and Opdivo and their combination, which significantly impacted countless cancer patients’ lives and meaningfully advanced the field of cancer therapy research. Dr. Korman began his career in the pharmaceutical industry at Supragen and NeXstar Pharmaceuticals, where he served as Director of Immunology.
Dr. Korman received his Ph.D. in Cellular and Developmental Biology from Harvard University, A.M. in Biology from Harvard University and A.B. in Biology from Brandeis University. Following the completion of his education, he was a Fellow at the Whitehead Institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In addition, Dr. Korman holds more than 30 patents and most notably, played an instrumental role in the discovery of the first anti-CTLA-4 checkpoint inhibitor.
