About Us
LyGenesis, Inc. is a clinical-stage cell therapy company that transforms a patient's lymph nodes into bioreactors capable of growing functioning ectopic organs.
Instead of one donor organ treating one patient, LyGenesis’ technology enables one donor organ to treat dozens of patients.
Instead of major surgery, LyGenesis uses outpatient endoscopic ultrasound for transplantation of its cell therapy, which enables cells to engraft, proliferate, and become a functioning ectopic organ.
LyGenesis’s cell therapies completely upend the economics and supply-demand calculus of organ transplantation by using the patient’s own lymph nodes as bioreactors to grow functioning ectopic organs. For the lead liver indication, one donated liver can treat dozens of ESLD patients, and the cell therapy is engrafted into the lymph nodes using an outpatient endoscopic ultrasound procedure, which is associated with substantially decreased medical risks and costs relative to full organ transplantation.
Team
Michael Hufford, PhD
Michael Hufford, PhD is a Co-Founder and the Chief Executive Officer of LyGenesis. An entrepreneur and drug developer, he has over 20 years of experience in the development and FDA regulatory approval of small molecules (Cypress Bioscience), biologics (Amylin Pharmaceuticals), as well as drug delivery technologies (e-Nicotine Technology). He has designed and executed clinical trials and drug development programs across a wide variety of therapeutic areas, from orphan metabolic diseases to psychiatric and oncology indications. His experience in- and out-licensing preclinical and clinical stage assets, executing corporate partnering deals, and in investor relations has helped him to raise public, private, and angel-back financing for his companies. His philanthropic work includes co-founding and serving as the CEO of Harm Reduction Therapeutics, Inc., a nonprofit pharmaceutical company developing low-cost over-the-counter intranasal naloxone in the US to help prevent opioid overdose deaths.
Dr. Hufford earned his undergraduate degree with distinction from Purdue University, and his master’s and doctoral degrees in Clinical Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh before completing a Research and Clinical Fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He is an award-winning lecturer, and the author of more than 100 scientific publications, presentations, and OpEds, with multiple issued and pending patents.