OneChain | Team

Team

Pablo Menéndez

Founder and CSO

Pablo Menéndez was awarded a PhD by the University of Salamanca in 2002. He then conducted postdoctoral training (2002-2006) in stem cell biology and childhood leukemia. He returned to Granada as Director of The Andalusian Stem Cell Bank and Principal Investigator at GENyO, a Pfizer-Andalusian Health Department centre for Genomics and Oncology (2007-2013). Since July 2013 he is an ICREA Research Professor and he heads the "Stem cell biology, developmental leukemia and Immunotherapy" group at the Josep Carreras Leukemia Institute-Campus Clinic Hospital-School of Medicine of the University of Barcelona. Pablo Menendez has published 190 peer-review publications with an accumulated impact factor of 2100 (H and i10 factors are 61 and 160, respectively). His work has been cited 13000 times. He has obtained solid competitive national and international research funding, has filed 10 patents in stem cell biology and immunotherapy, and has supervised >30 scientific staff including master, PhD students, postdoctoral scientists and technicians

Linked in

Stefanos Theoharis

CEO

Stefanos, PhD, with more than 20 years of broad experience in the cell and gene therapy space, business development, program management, manufacturing and basic research brings a deep knowledge C&GT sector. Former CBO of Bone Therapeutics, Belgium-based company, developing specialized cell therapies for orthopaedic disorders. Pior to that he was Senior Vice-President at Cell Medica, and CBO at apceth GmbH. He also held positions as Head of Business Development at the antisense RNA drug specialist Antisense Pharma (now Isarna), and Director Business Development at Roche, focused on partnering activities in emerging science and technologies. Stefanos also worked at Lazard, the global investment bank, advising to a variety of life sciences firms on M&As and financing transactions.

Linked in

Víctor M. Díaz Cortés

Research Director

With more than 15 years in biomedical and oncological research at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, the Hospital de la Vall d'Hebron, the New York University School of Medicine and the San Raffaele Biomedical Science Park in Milan, and the IMIM-Hospital del Mar. After completing his postdoctoral training, he joined the Universitat Pompeu Fabra as a full professor and later as an assistant, and has recently joined the International University of Catalonia.

Linked in

Wilmar Castillo Ávila

Clinical Operations Director

Wilmar has more than 15 years of biomedical research experience at the University of Barcelona, the pharmaceutical company Ferrer and the Catalan Institute of Oncology. During the last 6 years, she has focused her work on managing pharmaceutical development projects in different therapeutic areas in companies such as AlbaJuna Therapeutics SL and Spherium Biomed SL. As a project manager, she has led and coordinated multifunctional teams to ensure preclinical and clinical project's progress.

Linked in

Cristina Monge

Head of Administration

Cristina graduated in Business Sciences and has more than 20 years of professional experience. She worked in the pharmaceutical sector for more than 7 years in several roles, such as a Project Manager, Business Analyst and Executive Assistant, always collaborating with multidisciplinary teams in an international environment. Cristina also has more than 15 years of experience in the Financial Sector, were she worked as Senior Management Executive Assistant and as Deputy Director and Account Manager of bank office. Cristina joined OneChain Immunotherapeutics as Head of Administration to manage and coordinate the organization’s administration activities.

Linked in

Laura García Pérez

Senior Research Scientist

Biologist graduated at the University of Granada, she did her PhD in Immunology at the section of Molecular Gastroenterology and Immunology of the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf and the Immunobiology department at Yale University. Her research has focused on the role of T-cell derived cytokines in the context of intestinal inflammation and carcinogenesis. After her first postdoctoral training at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, she is joining OneChain Immunetherapeutics as Scientist

Linked in

Estibaliz Glaría Percaz

Senior Research Scientist

Estibaliz graduated in Biomedical Sciences and obtained the master’s degree in Advanced Immunology at the University of Barcelona and the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She conducted her Ph.D. in the immunology section of the University of Barcelona. Her research focused on modulating macrophage functions in the context of inflammation and bacterial infections by using nuclear receptor agonists. She joined OneChain Immunotherapeutics as a scientist to develop preclinical research on novel immunotherapies against cancer.

Linked in

María José Mansilla

Senior Research Scientist

María José graduated in Biotechnology and obtained the master’s degree in Immunology at the University of Barcelona and the Autonomous University of Barcelona. She conducted her Ph.D. at Cemcat (VHIR) characterizing the role of a putative molecule (HSP70) in the pathogenesis of multiple sclerosis (MS). As a postdoc at the Immunology Division of IGTP, she has participated in translating a new cell-based tolerogenic therapy for MS patients (autologous vitamin D3-tolerogenic dendritic cells) from the bench to the bed side. She has led the in vitro and in vivo preclinical studies and have conducted immunomonitoring studies of the MS patients enrolled in the phase I clinical trial (TOLERVIT-MS). Now she joined OneChain Immunotherapeutics to develop preclinical research on advanced immunotherapies against cancer.

Linked in

Erica Lafoz Garrido

Senior Laboratory Manager

Erica graduated in Biomedical Sciences and obtained her master’s degree in Translational Medicine at the University of Barcelona. Afterwards, she performed her Ph.D. exploring advanced chronic liver disease pathophysiology and new therapies at IDIBAPS and did a one-year postdoc performing precision medicine in the rare anaemias field in the Vall d’Hebron Research Institute. Erica joined OneChain Immunotherapeutics as a Laboratory Manager to deal with lab safety, provide technical support participating and carrying out experiments related to all the company's projects and maintain and organize lab resources.

Linked in

Sergi Casadó

Research Scientist

Sergi graduated with honors in Biochemistry and obtained the master’s degree in Biomedicine at University of Barcelona. He developed his Ph.D. research at IDIBAPS, characterizing the effect of membrane receptor expression and genetic variation on inflammatory diseases and cancer. During this time, he did a three-month internship at University of Basel to develop a part of this project focusing on inflammatory bowel disease. After one year of postdoc research at IDIBAPS on B leukemias, he joined OneChain Immunotherapeutics as a scientist to research into immunotherapies.

Linked in

Julia Cyran

Industrial PhD candidate

Julia graduated with honors in Medical Biotechnology at the University of Warsaw. During her studies she did one-year internship at the University of Chicago where she was searching for novel immunotherapeutic targets and testing innovatory BiTEs (Bispecific T cell engagers) and CAR T cell approaches against them. Post-graduation, she gained experience in industry working as a Quality Control Specialist at the Polish Stem Cells Bank where she was responsible for quality and safety of manufacturing CAR T cell therapy products for leukemic patients qualified for Hospital Exemption use. Currently she joined OneChain to perform research for her industrial doctorate studies.

Linked in

Alba García Pérez

Industrial PhD candidate

Alba graduated in Biomedical Sciences at the University of Barcelona. During her bachelor's degree, she did an internship in the Tumour Immunology department of the Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences (Netherlands), where she studied the role of PGE2-EP receptor signalling in myeloid-derived suppressor cells. Alba holds a master's degree in Advanced Immunology from the University of Barcelona and the Autonomous University of Barcelona and performed her master's thesis research at IDIBAPS developing patient-derived tumouroids as chronic lymphocytic leukaemia and follicular lymphoma models. She also gained experience in Global Market Access for Vaccines at Alira Health. Currently, she joined One Chain to conduct her industrial PhD working on the preclinical development of a dual-targeting CAR T-cell therapy for T-ALL.

Linked in

Irene Olivera

Junior Scientist

Irene pursued her PhD in Cancer Immunotherapy at Center for Applied Medical Research (CIMA, Universidad de Navarra), specializing in modifying the tumor microenvironment by overexpressing or blocking different cytokines to enhance immunotherapy strategies. These strategies include adoptive cell therapies and immune-checkpoint inhibitors targeting a wide variety of cancers. To support her research, she was awarded the competitive National Predoctoral Scholarship (2019-2023). Her dedication to patient benefits led her to join OneChain Immunotherapeutic as a Research Scientist, driven by her commitment to advancing cancer immunotherapy.

Linked in