Targeted Solutions Against Inflammatory Diseases

Expertise
Team
Partners

Our Mission

NOCENDRA’s mission is to deliver targeted solutions and develop drugs based on our discovery of natural active mediators that are both anti-inflammatory and pro-resolving, providing a new approach for the treatment of today’s major inflammatory diseases.
  • Our First Application: Periodontitis
    Worldwide, periodontitis is the major cause of tooth loss in adults. Our first goal is to deliver targeted solutions to promote oral health with efficient and easy to use products.
    Untreated periodontitis is particularly harmful to human health as it results in chronic systemic inflammation and increases risk of major inflammatory diseases.
    Our solution  produced impressive results in pre-clinical trials and is ready to go to Phase II.

Our Expertise

Our team has worked for more than 20 years on a new approach to resolving inflammation, with the discovery of a new class of compounds that naturally help the body return to pre-disease conditions. In the course of our research, we have seen that these mediators are extremely efficient for the treatment of inflammatory diseases such as periodontitis.

NOCENDRA brings strength and experience in all areas needed to optimize the health value of its portfolio.

  • The NOCENDRA team includes highly experienced experts in drug development
  • Our scientists have discovered and tested the compounds and developed analogs for oral use
  • We have all the functional expertise to maximize the value of new Oral Health products

Under an FDA approved IND, the Phase I clinical trial has been completed. There were no safety issues demonstrated with the lead candidate drug. Clinical evidence of reduction of inflammation was also observed.

Our Team

Our team has worked for more than 20 years on a new approach to resolving inflammation, and discovered a new class of compounds that naturally help the body return to pre-disease conditions.
Thomas Van Dyke, DDS, PhD
Founder and Consultant

Thomas Van Dyke is NOCENDRA’S founder. As Vice President for Clinical and Translational Research and Senior Member of the Staff at the Forsyth Institute, In addition to leading the Forsyth Center for Clinical and Translational Research, Dr. Van Dyke’s research is focused on the development of novel therapeutics for oral diseases by exploiting natural biological processes. He has been the lead developer of lipoxins and resolvins for oral use. Dr. Van Dyke also holds the rank of Professor, Faculty of Medicine, Harvard University.

Charles Serhan, PhD
Founder and Consultant

Dr. Serhan discovered lipoxins and resolvins and developed biologically active analogs.  Charles Nicholas Serhan is the Simon Gelman Professor of Anaesthesia (Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology) at Harvard Medical School and also Professor of Oral Medicine, Infection and Immunity at Harvard School of Dental Medicine. He is Director of the Center for Experimental Therapeutics and Reperfusion Injury at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He has been awarded a 10-year MERIT Award from the NIH, and recognized with numerous honors and awards.

Christopher R. Schuster, MBA
President and CFO
Mr. Schuster is an executive advisor to companies in healthcare, biotechnology, and life sciences, and has extensive experience in both publicly-traded and privately-held companies. Mr. Schuster is a strategically focused executive that has driven acquisitions, implemented aggressive growth plans and has a comprehensive background leading the functions of accounting, treasury, tax, legal, FP&A, operations, and human resources.
Wes Blakeslee, JD
General Counsel

Wes Blakeslee is a lawyer who provides legal and consulting services to universities, startups, corporations, and entrepreneurs in matters of technology transfer, operations, sponsored research, business formation, complex business issues and agreements, and on moving technology to market. Wes is a featured speaker at international, national, state and local conferences, and on behalf of bar associations.  He has been cited as a national authority on intellectual property issues in the Chronicle of Higher Education.

 

Jan Lessem, MD
Chief Medical Officer

President of ClinStrat, a consulting firm specialized in clinical strategies in drug/device development for registration, clinical trials planning and execution, Jan Lessem has a demonstrated history of working in the pharmaceuticals industry with specific experience in Cardiovascular, Anti-Inflammatory, Diabetic, & Periodontal Drug Development and . He holds a Ph.D focused in Cardiovascular Science from University of Lund, Sweden.

Our Partners