James Appleman

James (Jim) Appleman, Ph.D. is SVP, R&D and CSO, Co-founder, Director of Primmune. Dr. Appleman brings to Primmune nearly thirty years of experience in building successful drug discovery organizations. He has been an advisor to biotech, hi-tech and diagnostic firms. Dr. Appleman is a co-founder of eFFECTOR Therapeutics ($45M original Series A funding) where he established both the technology base and bioinformatics infrastructure to support eFFECTOR’s unique programs targeting dysregulated mRNA translation. He previously served as Senior Vice President, Research and Chief Scientific Officer at Anadys Pharmaceuticals, Inc. where he played a pivotal role in the business process culminating in the acquisition of Anadys for $230M (256% premium to market cap) by Roche Pharma and in the invention, characterization and clinical development of the company's internally discovered drug candidates setrobuvir and ANA773. ANA773 is a novel TLR7 (toll-like receptor 7) agonist originally intended for the treatment of cancer and hepatic viral diseases. Prior to joining Anadys, Dr. Appleman held positions at Gensia, Inc. and it’s subsidiary Metabasis Therapeutics and was a faculty member at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. He received a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Oklahoma State University and completed his postdoctoral training at Dartmouth Medical School. At Anadys, Dr. Appleman personally led the ANA773 team from conception through realization (characterization of target-mediated biology, selection of medicinal chemistry starting points, lead optimization, candidate selection, preclinical development, clinical proof of concept). The combination of practical experience with this TLR7 agonist and other activators of innate immunity coincidental with the emergence of immunotherapy as paramount in the successful treatment of cancer places Primmune at the very heart of the most compelling area of drug discovery and development today.