About

Founders

Management

Michael Evans, Ph.D.

Co-Founder & EVP of Research

Mike is a co-founder of TheraPaint and serves as the EVP of Research. He is currently a Professor in the Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging at University of California at San Francisco. As a chemical biologist, he brings to TheraPaint deep experience in biomarker discovery and radiopharmaceutical development in imaging and the treatment of cancer. Dr. Evans has published over 85 peer-reviewed articles and is a co-inventor on over 15 patents pending or issued in the chemical biology and radiopharmaceutical space. He has founded and or served on the scientific advisory board of several biotech companies, including ORIC Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Hap10, Inc., and Honeybear Biosciences, Inc. He is the recipient of numerous honors, including a Young Investigator Award from the Prostate Cancer Foundation, a Pathway to Independence Award from the National Cancer Institute, a Research Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society, the 2023 Roger Tsien Award for Excellence in Chemical Biology from the World Molecular Imaging Society and most recently the 2024 Sam Gambhir Trailblazer Award from the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging. He was also an inductee into the 2020 class of the Council of Distinguished Investigators in the Academy of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging Research. Dr. Evans earned his BA from St. Mary’s College of Maryland and received his PhD in Organic Chemistry from The Scripps Research Institute with a postdoctoral fellowship in Molecular Imaging from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.

Charles S. Craik, Ph.D.

Co-Founder

Charly is a co-founder of TheraPaint and is a Professor in the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the University of California at San Francisco and is Associate Director of Translational Research and Co-Director of the Molecular Oncology Program in the Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. His research has focused on defining the roles and the mechanisms of enzymes, protein degradation machinery, receptors, membrane transporters and other challenging proteins in complex biological processes and on developing technologies to facilitate these studies. Dr Craik is known for his work on structure-function relationships in proteases that include structure guided approaches to drug design, global substrate profiling technologies and protein engineering and noninvasive imaging efforts that provide an understanding of both the chemical make-up and the biological importance of key disease associated proteins in multiple therapeutic areas. Dr. Craik co-founded Catalyst Biosciences and Alaunus Biosciences, and currently serves on the scientific advisory boards of Werewolf Therapeutics, Maverick Therapeutics (acquired by Takeda) and Janux Therapeutics. He is a council member of the American Association of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB), a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the National Academy of Inventors (NAI) and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He earned his BA from Allegheny College and received his PhD in chemistry from Columbia University.

Lawrence Fong, M.D.

Co-Founder & EVP of Clinical Development

Larry is a co-founder of TheraPaint and serves as the EVP of Clinical Development. He is the Bezos Distinguished Scholar and Director Immunotherapy Integrated Research Center at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center since 2024. Prior to this, he was the Efim Guzik Distinguished Professor in Cancer Biology in the Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center where he founded the Cancer Immunotherapy Program at the University of California at San Francisco. Dr. Fong is a leader in novel cancer therapies having been involved in both pre-clinical and clinical studies of multiple FDA-approved therapies including Keytruda®, Yervoy®, and Pluvicto®. Throughout his career, he has innovated in the approaches to study cancer patients and has co-authored over 100 peer-reviewed research publications. Dr. Fong currently serves on the scientific advisory boards for Abbvie, Bioatla, Nutcracker, RAPT, Senti, Sutro, Innovent, Merck and Roche/Genentech. He is an elected member of the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society and the American Society for Clinical Investigation. He is also an NIH Outstanding Investigator Award recipient. He has served as a standing member on multiple NIH study sections, the NCI Steering Committees for Genitourinary Cancer (GUSC), the NCI Investigational Drugs (IDSC)-Immunotherapy Task Force, the Department of Defense Prostate Cancer Research Program (PCRP) Vision Setting Committee, and the inaugural NCI Immuno-oncology Translation Network (IOTN) Steering Committee. Dr. Fong earned his BA from Columbia College and received his MD from Stanford University School of Medicine.

Nassim Usman, Ph.D.

Interim Chief Executive Officer

Nassim serves as the interim Chief Executive Officer of TheraPaint. He is currently the President and CEO of Totus Medicines. Previously he served as the President and CEO of Catalyst Biosciences (CBIO), a publicly traded Protease Medicines company and is a Venture Partner at Morgenthaler Ventures. He has held Executive (VP, SVP, CSO, COO & CEO) and Board positions at several public and private biotech companies (Gyre Therapeutics, Catalyst Biosciences, Principia, Mosaic, Sirna, RPI, Osprey, Archemix, Atugen, Noxxon). During his career, he has advanced several drugs into clinical development, executed multiple licensing deals, and raised capital through private and public financings. Prior to his biotech career he was an accomplished RNA chemist authoring more than 70 scientific articles and 130 patents and applications. He developed a method for the solid-phase synthesis of RNA that is widely used in science and in two marketed RNA products (Macugen™ & Onpattro™). Dr Usman received his BSc and PhD degree from McGill University and was a post-doctoral fellow and Staff Scientist at MIT.

Grant E. Blouse, Ph.D.

Chief Scientific Officer

Grant serves as the Chief Scientific Officer of TheraPaint. He most recently was the Chief Scientific Officer of Catalyst Biosciences and held several roles of increasing responsibility (VP, SVP, CSO) where he contributed to the advancement of two clinical candidates and built a complement therapeutics platform that was acquired by Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Prior to Catalyst Biosciences, Dr. Blouse was a Principal Scientist and Project Lead at Novo Nordisk A/S, Biopharm, where he led early and late-stage rare disease projects and drove the strategic evaluation of new therapeutic areas. Prior to Novo Nordisk, Dr. Blouse was a senior scientist at Catalyst Biosciences where he helped to build Catalyst’s next-generation biotherapeutics franchise, including helping to identify the Factor VIIa candidate Marzeptacog alfa (activated) and co-inventing the Factor IX candidate Dalcinonacog alfa. Dr. Blouse has held research and investigator positions at Aarhus University’s Department of Molecular Biology, Henry Ford Health System’s Division of Biochemical Research and Wayne State University School of Medicine’s Department of Pharmacology. He has published widely and is an inventor on multiple patents in the protease engineering and biology space. Dr. Blouse earned his BA in Anthropology from the University of Delaware, his MSc in Biochemistry from Clemson University, and his PhD in Pharmacology from Wayne State University School of Medicine with a postdoctoral fellowship in cancer degradomics at Aarhus University.