C4 Therapeutics (C4T) has announced details of the leadership team recruited to develop a new class of broadly applicable small molecule drugs for degrading disease-relevant proteins for therapeutic benefit. The leadership team includes Isabel Chiu, Ph.D., as senior vice president of Translational Sciences and Alliance Management, Stewart Fisher, Ph.D., as senior vice president of Discovery Sciences, Tim Heffernan, Ph.D., as senior vice president of Biology, and Christopher Nasveschuk, Ph.D., as vice president of Chemistry.

“Isabel, Stew, Tim, and Chris are recognized leaders in translational research, biochemistry and discovery sciences, cancer biology and chemistry. Over the past six months they have added much momentum to our science and capabilities build. Their deep expertise in drug discovery will continue to advance our development of first-in-class Degronimid molecules for the treatment of cancer and other life-threatening and life-impairing diseases,” said Andy Phillips, Ph.D., chief scientific officer of C4 Therapeutics.

Dr. Chiu most recently served as vice president of Translational and Clinical Science at Enumeral Biomedical and was previously vice president of Translational Research at AVEO Oncology. In these roles, Dr. Chiu was responsible for target and biomarker discovery, validation, preclinical development, and played key leadership roles in strategic partnerships. She also contributed to the development of numerous small molecule and antibody programs in the clinic through external collaborations and internal pipelines. She received her postdoctoral training at Johns Hopkins Medical School, holds a Ph.D. in biology from MIT, and a B.A. in biochemistry from Brandeis University.

Dr. Fisher previously held senior leadership roles at the Broad Institute and AstraZeneca across target validation, drug discovery, and clinical candidate support. Dr. Fisher started his career at Hoffmann-La Roche after completing an NIH Postdoctoral Fellowship at Harvard Medical School. He holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the California Institute of Technology and a B.A. in chemistry from the University of Vermont.

Prior to joining C4 Therapeutics, Dr. Heffernan held positions of increasing responsibility at the Institute for Applied Cancer Science at MD Anderson Cancer Center. He most recently served as co-director and head of Drug Development, where he managed drug discovery and research programs from target identification through preclinical development. Previously, Dr. Heffernan led target discovery at the Belfer Institute for Applied Cancer Science at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He holds a Ph.D. in cell and molecular pathology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and performed his postdoctoral training at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Nasveschuk joined C4 Therapeutics from the Broad Institute, where he led a group of medicinal chemists in projects in the cancer, metabolism, and autophagy disease areas at the Center for the Development of Therapeutics. Prior to Broad, Dr. Nasveschuk was an integral member of the team at Constellation Pharmaceuticals where he co-invented the EZH2 inhibitor CPI-1205 and helped to discover and develop the BET inhibitor CPI-0610. He holds a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Colorado State University and a B.S. in chemistry from Middlebury College.