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Leon Murphy has broad expertise building and leading teams that develop novel therapeutics for cancer, neurodegeneration and metabolic and inflammatory disorders. He is an industry-leading expert in autophagy, mTOR and PI3-Kinases and has authored several patents and published in high-impact journals such as Cell, Molecular Cell and Nature Cell Biology. Leon brings nearly 20 years of drug discovery and development experience, in both academic and industry settings, and is a frequent invited speaker at and organizer of international research conferences. Prior to joining Casma Therapeutics, Leon was an entrepreneur-in-residence at Third Rock Ventures, where he helped in the discovery and launch of new companies including Casma.

At the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, where he worked for 13 years, Leon was the director of chemical biology and therapeutics and led a global drug discovery team that worked on both rare genetic disorders and common diseases. During this time, Leon advanced multiple programs from target and lead discovery through optimization, nomination of development candidates and first-in-human clinical trials. Prior to joining Novartis, Leon was an instructor and research fellow in the department of cell biology at Harvard Medical School, where he led projects on RAS-MAPK, functional genomics and an external partnership with large pharma. Leon has received funding from the American Cancer Society and The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Leon earned his B.S. in biochemistry from The Queen’s University of Belfast in Northern Ireland and his Ph.D. in biomedical science from Creighton University School of Medicine in Omaha.