Key Partners

Mohammad Afshar, PhD
Mohammad is the CEO and co-founder of Ariana Pharmaceuticals.

He was one of the founding members of the senior management group at RiboTargets, Cambridge, UK, where, as the Director of IT and Head of Drug Design, he set up and managed RiboTargets` structure based discovery platform RiboDock^® - rDock. The patented technology developed within his team (RiboDock^® - rDock) allowed the identification and validation of novel therapeutic molecules, becoming the central focus of RiboTargets. He was actively involved in the company’s business development.

He was one of three members of the RiboTargets - Johnson and Johnson joint research committee and left RiboTargets to launch Ariana Pharmaceuticals at the end of 2002, prior to the company’s successful merger with British Biotech.

Before joining RiboTargets he was a reserach fellow at the Department of Chemistry of the University of York. He obtained a Medical Degree (DCEM), MPhil in computer science, a PhD in structural biochemistry and a “Habilitation doctorate” from the University of Montpellier, France. He is currently a committee member of the Molecular Graphics and Modeling Society.

m dot afshar at arianapharma dot com

Alain Commerçon, PhD
Alain is currently Research Director within the "Lead Generation" organization at Aventis Pharma. His responsibilities include managing the High Throughput Medicinal Chemistry department of the Paris research centre (Vitry and Romainville).

He started his career with Rhone Poulenc Health Care in 1979 and was appointed to distinguished positions in particular as head of Chemistry-Oncology. Between 1996 and 1997, as the director of New Lead Generation, he has set up the combinatorial chemistry group at RPR France. He has directly contributed to the discovery and development of 3 molecules that are either on the market or in late phase II clinical trials. Alain is a non executive director of Ariana Pharmaceuticals.

Jean Sallantin, PhD
An expert in artificial intelligence, Jean is a Director of Research at the LIRMM “Laboratoire d’Informatique, de Robotique et de Micro-électronique de Montpellier” of the CNRS in Montpellier France. One of the pioneers of bioinformatics in France, Jean established the bioinformatics laboratory at the Curie Institute Paris (1983-85) and was the director of the GSDIARL research consortium (1985-89) involving Sanofi, the CNRS Pharmacology Institute, the CNRS centre for macromolecular biochemistry and the Montpellier University Medical Centre.

From 1993 to 1996, he was appointed the ministry of research correspondent on Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive sciences. He currently heads the “Rationality and machine learning” team that develops and studies the applications of machine learning techniques in a scientific discovery environment. The methods and algorithms developed in his group have led to a number of patents and collaborations with large companies such as Areva, BNP Paribas and Fidal KPMG. Jean is leading the technology transfer between the CNRS and Ariana and is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board.

Scientific Advisory Board

Professor Jacques Demaille, MD, PhD
A leading figure of French medical research, Jacques Demaille is an expert in biochemistry and human genetics and has been one of the pioneers of the French genome sequencing effort.

He has held a number of distinguished academic and scientific positions, including the director of the CNRS Life Sciences Department, the Institute of Human Genetics in Montpellier, the Department of Genetics of Montpellier University Hospital as well as the presidency of the University of Montpellier I. He is currently the president of the University of Nimes.

Professor Guy Dodson, PhD, Fellow of the Royal Society
A world famous crystallographer, Guy Dodson is currently the director of the Biophysical and Structural Sciences Department of the National Institute for Medical Research of the Medical Research Council in London. He has started his career in Dorothy Hodgkin’s laboratory in Oxford, and is one of the co-discoverers of the structure of Insulin.

He set up the structural biology laboratories at the University of York and NIMR in London and has established numerous collaborations with the pharmaceutical industry, including the structure based design of the Novo-Nordisk’s fast release Insulin.