Shaping Immune Therapies,
Transforming Lives.

Piotr Trzonkowski

Piotr Trzonkowski has served as President of the Management Board, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) since 1 May 2019. Co-founder and key shareholder of PolTREG, which was established as a spin-off from the Medical University of Gdańsk to develop and commercialize the patented TREG method. Piotr Trzonkowski is a highly accomplished medical professional and researcher. He graduated from the Medical University of Gdańsk and has obtained various degrees and titles throughout his career. Initially focusing on immune disorders in the elderly and their impact on vaccinations, Piotr Trzonkowski’s research later expanded to include immune tolerance in transplants and autoimmune diseases. His team was the first in the world to introduce immunosuppressive regulatory T cell therapy in human trials. Piotr Trzonkowski is currently the Head of the Department and Unit of Medical Immunology at the Medical University of Gdańsk. He has also completed postdoctoral internships at the University of Oxford and served as a visiting Professor at the University of Chicago. In recognition of his research, Piotr Trzonkowski received the prestigious Foundation for the Polish Science Prize in 2017. He has held positions of leadership in various scientific organizations, including Deputy President of the Polish Society of Experimental and Clinical Immunology. Additionally, he is a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Committee of Scientific Awards of the Polish Diabetes Association, and the Immunoprophylaxis Commission of the Committee for Immunology and Etiology of Human Infections of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

Mariusz Jabłoński

Mariusz Jabłoński has been a Member of the Executive Management Board since December 2017. He has extensive experience in medical business management, spanning over 20 years. He graduated from the Medical University of Łódź and began his career as a research assistant at the university. From 1993 to 2007, he held various managerial positions at Eli Lilly in Poland and internationally. During this time, he excelled in sales and marketing roles, serving as Sales Director in Poland, Business Unit Manager in the Czech Republic, and Sales Force Capability Manager for Central-Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. Between 2007 and 2012, Mariusz Jabłoński served as the Chief Executive Officer of Philips Healthcare in Central and Eastern Europe, as well as in Finland, Cyprus, and Ireland. Additionally, he was a member of the Management Board of Philips Polska during that period. Presently, he is a partner at PAAN CAPITAL investment fund which holds a significant shareholder position in PolTREG.

Dan Shelly, PhD, MBA

Member of the Executive Leadership Team for PolTREG where he is responsible for advancing next generation T-regulatory cell therapies for Autoimmune disease. Previously, he was the VP of Business Development and Alliances at Prescient Therapeutics where he was responsible for advancing a next-generation, modular, and post-infusion controllable CAR-Immune cell therapy platform along with small molecule targeted therapies. Previously, he was Director of Global Business Development and Strategic Partnerships for the global non-profit PATH, where he was the Co-Lead for the COVID-19 task force. He has over 19 years of biopharmaceutical BD licensing and alliance management experience. He is also an adjunct professor in the Masters in Clinical Drug Development program at the University of Cincinnati’s College of Pharmacy.

Adrian Bot, M.D., Ph.D.

Founding CSO and EVP of R&D Capstan Therapeutics, a company developing in vivo CAR-T for Autoimmune disease, which was acquired by AbbVie for $2.1B.  Previously, CSO and VP of Translational Medicine at Kite Pharma and Kite where he led development and approval of Yescarta and Tecartus.Dr. Bot also served in various senior R&D leadership positions at MannKind Corp and Alliance Pharmaceutical Corp, La Jolla, California. M.D. in Romania in 1993. Ph.D. in Biomedical Sciences at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York in 1998. Guest Scientist at Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California.

Jay S. Skyler, MD, MACP, FRCP

Jay S. Skyler, MD, MACP, FRCP is currently a Professor of Medicine, Pediatrics, & Psychology, in the Division of Endocrinology Diabetes & Metabolism, Department of Medicine, University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine, Miami, Florida.  He served as Director of that Division from 2000 to 2004.  He is Deputy Director for Clinical Research and Academic Programs at the Diabetes Research Institute, University of Miami. He also is an Adjunct Professor of Pediatrics at the Barbara Davis Center for Childhood Diabetes, University of Colorado at Denver.  For 22 years (1993-2015), he was Study Chairman for the NIH Diabetes Prevention Trial for Type 1 Diabetes (DPT-1) and its successor Type 1 Diabetes TrialNet, an international network conducting clinical trials to interdict type 1 diabetes.  Dr. Skyler also was Chair of the Strategy Advisory Group for INNODIA, a European consortium of academic and industry groups developing innovative approaches towards understanding and arresting type 1 diabetes; and is Chair of the Strategic Advisory Board of the EDENT1FI consortium (European action for the Diagnosis of Early Non-clinical T1D for Disease Interception). He was President of the American Diabetes Association and Vice-President of the International Diabetes Federation. He was founding Editor-in-Chief of Diabetes Care and founding Scientific Editor of the International Diabetes Monitor.

Desmond Schatz, MD

Desmond Schatz, MD is Professor and  of Pediatrics, Medical Director of the Diabetes Institute and Director of the Clinical Research Center within the CTSI at the University of Florida, Gainesville.  He served as Interim Chair of Pediatrics from 2019-2022 and as President of Science and Medicine of the American Diabetes Association in 2016. Dr. Schatz has been involved in Type 1 diabetes research since the mid 1980’s and has published over 450 manuscripts, the majority related to the prediction, natural history, genetics, immunopathogenesis and prevention of the disease, as well as the management of children and adolescents with Type 1 diabetes. He is the Principal Investigator (PI) on several NIH awards. He is the recipient of multiple awards including the Mary Tyler Moore and S Robert Levine JDRF Excellence in Clinical Research Award, the 2009 Cure Award from the American Diabetes Association, the 2010 Public Policy Leadership Award, the prestigious Banting Medal for service from the American Diabetes Association, the ISPAD Prize for achievement (the highest honor of the International Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Diabetes) both in 2016 and, more recently in 2021, the distinguished George Eisenbarth Award from the JDRF for outstanding research advances toward the prevention of Type 1 diabetes. In 2022 he was elected into the prestigious Academy of Science, Engineering and Medicine of Florida (ASEMFL).

Lawrence Steinman, MD

Lawrence Steinman, MD is a professor of Neurology and Neurological Sciences, Pediatrics, and Genetics.  He also served as the Chair of the Stanford University Interdepartmental Program in Immunology from 2003-2011. Dr. Steinman’s research focuses on what provokes relapses and remission in multiple sclerosis (MS), the nature of the molecules that serve as a brake on the brain inflmmation, and the quest for a tolerizing vaccine for autoimmune diseases like type 1 diabetes and neuromyelitis optica.  He has developed two antigen specific therapies, using DNA vaccines, for MS and type 1 diabetes.  He was senior author on the seminal 1992 Nature article that reported the key role of a particular integrin in brain inflammation.  This research led to the development of the drug Tysabri, which is used to treat patients with MS and Crohn’s disease. Dr. Steinman received his BA from Dartmouth College and his MD from Harvard University. He was a post-doctoral fellow in chemical immunology fellow at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. Dr. Steinman returned to Stanford University Hospital as a resident in pediatric and adult neurology and then joined the faculty at Stanford in 1980. Dr. Steinman holds a number of patents in the areas of immunology, and for therapies of Huntington Disease, type 1 diabetes and MS. He cofounded Neurocrine Biosciences, Bayhill Therapeutics now named Tolerion, Nuon Therapeutics, Transparency Life Sciences and Atreca.