Founder / CEO
Meenal Lele is the founder and CEO of Hanimune Therapeutics, a business
transforming the food allergy treatment market, and Lil Mixins, a CPG
business transforming the food allergy prevention market.
As a food allergy & asthma parent, Meenal has committed herself to bringing an end to the immune diseases that plague 80 million Americans, starting with food allergies. She is also the author of The Baby and the Biome, a revolutionary look at immune diseases, the current science, and practical solutions to reverse them.
Meenal was previously on the founding team of Knee Creations (acquired by Zimmer) and early team of Velano Vascular (acquired by BD). Meenal has designed, run, and published multiple large clinical studies across orthopedics, vascular medicine, and immunology, and holds patents in each. She has a dual-degree in chemical engineering and business from the University of Pennsylvania.
Advisor
Dr. Nowak is a Professor of Pediatrics at NYU Grossman School of Medicine. Her research interests focus on egg and milk allergies, food-induced anaphylaxis in children, novel diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to food allergy, oral tolerance development, and in particular food protein-induced enterocolitis syndrome. Dr. Nowak-Węgrzyn has published many articles in peer-reviewed journals and book chapters. She has been an invited speaker at many national and international conferences. She served as the President of the New York Allergy and Asthma Society in 2010 and has been a member of the Society’s executive committee for the past 15 years. She served as the Chair of the Adverse Reactions to Foods Committee of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology from 2013-2015 and is the current Secretary of FADDA, AAAAI. She is also the chair of the Medical Advisory Board for the International FPIES Organization.
Advisor
Dr. Leonard is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Allergy and Immunology and the director of the food allergy research center at Rady Children's Hospital. A food allergy sufferer herself, her research interests are in understanding and treating life-threatening reactions to foods. She received her M.D. degree and completed her residency at Columbia University, and completed her fellowship at the Jaffe Food Allergy Institute at Mount Sinai.
Advisor
Previously the Chief Medical Officer at Aimmune Therapeutics, Daniel has an exceptional history leading drug development at biotechnology companies for more than 20 years. Prior to Aimmune, he served as Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President of Development at Alvine Pharmaceuticals and Sunesis, and filled various roles at Pharmacyclics, and Genentech. As an allergist and immunologist, he has also taught and practiced medicine at UCSF for more than 25 years and published extensively in allergy, clinical immunology and autoimmunity, and oncology. Dan has served on the research advisory board of Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE) and on the editorial board of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, and he now serves on several clinical and scientific advisory boards in addition to the editorial boards of Clinical Immunology and Journal of Clinical Immunology.
Advisor
Dr. Bird is a Dedman Family Scholar in Clinical Care, the director of the Food Allergy Center at Children’s Health, and a professor of pediatrics and internal medicine in the Division of Allergy and Immunology at UT Southwestern Medical Center. His research interests are in understanding and treating life-threatening reactions to foods, and he is currently working with colleagues in several ongoing clinical trials using food proteins for immunotherapy.
Advisor
David M. Essayan, MD, specializes in the development of new therapies for cancer and immunologic diseases. David was previously the Executive Director of Regulatory Affairs at Amgen, Inc. Prior to Amgen, David was a Supervisory Medical Officer at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and a Principle Investigator in the Laboratory of Tumor Molecular Biology, also at FDA.
David received his BS in Chemistry from Yale University and his MD from the University of Pennsylvania. He completed his Residency in Internal Medicine at Temple University Hospital and his Fellowship in Allergy and Clinical Immunology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, where he held a faculty appointment for 12 years.