Team
Wolfgang Sadee | Chief Science Officer & Founder
A globally respected thought leader in opioid pharmacology, Dr. Wolfgang Sadee is a founder of æther Therapeutics and serves as Chief Scientific Officer. Dr. Sadee is also Professor em. of Cancer Biology and Genetics, College of Medicine, at the Ohio State University, and Professor em. of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences, Colleges of Pharmacy and Medicine, at the University of California San Francisco. Dr. Sadee’s prolific research (well over 400 research papers and monographs) has focused on opioid pharmacology, therapeutics, pharmacogenomics, drug response and toxicity.
Aaron Schuchart | President & Chief Executive Officer
Aaron Schuchart is Aether’s President and CEO. For the past thirty years, he has held senior leadership positions in Operations, Finance, Business Development, and Corporate Strategy spanning the therapeutics, industrial, and agricultural sectors. Most recently, Mr. Schuchart was Chief Business Officer of Lumos Pharma, a publicly traded biotech company developing novel compounds for rare disease and cancer. He was also Head of Business Development and Strategy for the Diagnostics division of Novartis where he led the integration of that business into Grifols. Previously, Mr. Schuchart was Managing Director of Proaltus Partners, a boutique advisory firm providing strategy and business development services to early-stage biotech companies. He also held senior positions in Finance and Business Development for Amgen. He has a BBA in Accounting from Texas Tech University and an MBA from the Anderson School at UCLA.
Bruce Imbert | Chief Medical Officer & Head of R&D
Bruce Imbert, MD, PhD, MPH, has more than 20 years of clinical development, regulatory and strategy at Invidior, Tempero Bio and Pear Therapeutics. He is a proven leader in developing CNS therapies, including significant accomplishments in the areas of pain and addiction. He most recently led the development programs for Sublocade a buprenorphine formulation approved for the treatment of OUD, and Opvee, an opioid antagonist for use in opioid overdose.
Laurence Nore | Fractional COO
Laurence Nore, MBA, has served in multiple senior operational, financial, and business development roles for the past 25 years at Amgen, PDL Biopharma, Roche Diagnostics among others. She is a strategic and tactical leader in R&D project management, has led and negotiated multiple deals and financings. More recently at IgGenix, she established in Australian subsidiary and managed the CRO, sites and vendors to execute their First-in-Human trial.
Board of Directors
Rick Hawkins | Founder & Chairman
Rick Hawkins is a 40 year veteran in the biotechnology field and a pioneer in the CRO and CDMO industries. He has successfully founded multiple companies with successful exits including Pharmaco/PPD and Sensus/Pfizer. Most recently, he was Founder, President, and CEO of Lumos Pharma, a drug development company focused on rare disease and cancer therapeutics. He currently serves on the Boards of Savara, Plus Therapeutics, and is an advisor to ID2, a pharmaceutical accelerator, and the President’s Innovation Council at UT Austin.
Jon Saxe | Board Member and Lead Director
Jon Saxe brings a wealth of experience, having served on over 25 Boards with multiple successful exits. Mr. Saxe was the Vice President, Corporate Development & Licensing, of Hoffmann-LaRoche, CEO of Synergen, President of PDL Biopharma between 1995 and 2000 and served on its board between 1989 and 2010. Currently, Mr. Saxe is the lead director of the investment entity Kyto Technology and Life Sciences.
Phil Skolnick, Ph.D., D.Sc. (hon.) | Board Member
Phil Skolnick has served in both the public and private sectors. Following a 25-year career at the NIH Intramural Research Program (Bethesda, MD), he was appointed a Lilly Fellow in Neuroscience. Three years later, he and his colleagues founded DOV Pharmaceuticals, a NASDAQ listed corporation. At DOV, he served as Chief Scientific Officer and later as President and CSO. He rejoined the NIH in 2010 as Director, Division of Therapeutics and Medical Consequences at the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He returned to the private sector in 2017 as Chief Scientific Officer at Opiant Pharmaceuticals, which was listed on NASDAQ in 2018. Opiant was acquired by Indivior in March 2023. Skolnick served as a Fellow at Indivior from 2023-2025.
John D. Harris | Board Member
As a member of æther THERAPEUTICS Board of Directors, John Harris brings a strong background in clinical trials, and leadership experience at large, medium and start-up organizations in the biotech and cell therapy fields. He currently is the CEO of BioFire Defense and previously served as æther's President & CEO between June 2022 and January 2025. John's deep operational, executive and market development capabilities are assets to the board.
John McKew | Board Member
John McKew is President and Chief Scientific Officer of Lumos Pharma. Dr. McKew has twenty-seven years of experience developing novel therapeutics where he successfully advanced therapies through preclinical and into clinical development. Prior to Lumos Pharma, Dr. McKew served as V.P. of research at aTyr Pharma where he led a research team discovering and advancing protein-based therapeutics for rare diseases. He has also served as Acting Scientific Director for the National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS) intramural group, a part of the National Institute of Health (NIH).
Advisors
Bob Davis | Senior Advisor, Clinical & Regulatory
Bob Davis has over 35 years of experience in biopharma and global CROs designing, advising and conducting clinical trials at Lumos, Parke Davis, Searle, Sensus, Pharmaco among others. He has also been part of the development of multiple drugs that received FDA approval.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/bob-davis-755367b/