Craig F. Plato

Biography

Since founding PBI in 2010, Dr. Plato has been growing the company and leading a team of scientists in providing pre-clinical CRO services to clients in Pharmaceutical and Biotech organizations, as well as academia. Dr. Plato leads and prioritizes the company’s scientific endeavors. He collaborates with clients and directs strategic planning to meet study objectives. Prior to founding PBI, Dr. Plato led in vivo pharmacology for Gilead Sciences, Inc. which acquired his previous employer, Myogen, Inc., in 2005 to diversify to the cardiovascular and renal disease areas. During his tenure at Myogen-Gilead, Dr. Plato led CKD drug discovery efforts, participating extensively in preclinical & clinical development activities for the Endothelin Receptor Antagonist program, and managed the team responsible for generating preclinical data requested by the FDA for approval of Ambrisentan Orphan Drug status for Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis in 2009. Craig led his team to the forefront of several drug discovery efforts including Histone Deacetylase Inhibitors, Protein Kinase D Inhibitors, and α-Myosin Heavy Chain upregulators for the Myogen-Novartis collaboration, focusing on heart failure and pathological cardiac hypertrophy. From those projects, Dr. Plato provided the first direct evidence for and patented the use of HDAC inhibitors as combination therapeutics for the treatment of cardiac dysfunction. Craig served on the APS Renal Section Steering Committee (2006-2009), was Chair of the APS “Physiologists in Industry Committee” and authored or co-authored several articles on the committee’s homepage. Prior to these efforts, Dr. Plato was a Senior Scientist in Cardiorenal and Safety Pharmacology at Abbott Laboratories where he focused on diabetic nephropathy, electrophysiologic safety, and platelet function. During Craig’s academic career, he was twice awarded the American Physiological Society (APS) “Excellence in Renal Research Award” and the American Heart Association “Merck New Investigator Award.” Dr. Plato received his Ph.D. Degree in Physiology from the Medical College of Wisconsin. He performed his postdoctoral training and was appointed to the faculty in the Hypertension and Vascular Research Division at Henry Ford Hospital.

Research Interest

Plato BioPharma, Inc. (PBI) was founded in 2010 by Dr. Craig Plato who had the vision to build a world-class preclinical drug discovery CRO specializing in in vivo physiological and pharmacological studies with complimentary biochemical, biomarker and histology analysis in the cardiovascular, renal, pulmonary, diabetes and hepatic therapeutic areas