Guo-liang Yu

Biography

Dr. Yu co-founded Epitomics Inc., an antibody based Biotechnology Company recently acquired by Abcam for $170M. He served as Chairman, President, and CEO of Epitomics Inc. for 10 years. Dr. Yu's success is driven by his scientific curiosity and a passion for translating scientific discovery to real products. His challenge is to balance his time between science and business, fun and work, family and community. He moved from China to the US to pursue advanced training after graduating from Fudan University in 1984. He obtained his Ph.D. from UC Berkeley where he contributed to the discovery of telomerase and its mechanism of action in Dr. Blackburn's lab. Drs. Blackburn and Greider received the Nobel Prize in 2009 for their discovery. After graduating, Dr. Yu joined Dr. Ausubel's lab at Harvard to pursue the question of how plants defend themselves against pathogens without an immune system. He identified the first plant disease resistance gene. In 1993, Dr. Yu became one of the first Senior Scientists to join Human Genome Sciences Inc., when genomics was still in its infancy, to identify human genes for drug discovery. Among several important drug targets he studied, he successfully identified BLyS as the first genomic target for the development of a lupus antibody (Benlysta®, which was approved by the FDA in 2010).

Research Interest

 Cancer