Dr. Björn Walse, founder, CEO
Dr. Björn Walse, co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of SARomics Biostructures AB, has over 30 years of drug discovery and research management experience from the biotech industry. Before establishing SARomics Biostructures, Dr. Walse served as head of structural chemistry at Active Biotech AB, where he was responsible for building and running the structural chemistry platform. At Active Biotech, he also participated in the molecular design of biopharmaceutical therapeutics for an oncology indication. Before this, Dr. Walse performed postdoctoral research at UC Berkeley. Dr. Walse received his Doctorate in physical chemistry from Lund University and his M.Sc. in Chemical Engineering from Lund Institute of Technology.
Prof. Derek Logan, founder, CSO
Derek Logan has been CSO at SARomics Biostructures AB since its foundation. He has a B.Sc. in Chemistry with Computer Applications from Glasgow University and a D. Phil. in Molecular Biophysics from Oxford University. In addition to his role at SARomics, he has been an associate professor in Molecular Biophysics at Lund University since 2002. Derek has extensive international research experience from the Universities of Oxford, Strasbourg, and Stockholm. Current academic research includes integrative structural biology methods (X-ray crystallography, small angle X-ray scattering, neutron diffraction, and cryo-electron microscopy) to understand biomolecular structure-function relationships at multiple levels of organization and detail. He has also been involved in the development of facilities for structural biology at the MAX IV synchrotron and serves on an advisory panel to the European Spallation Source. In addition, he is a member of the Executive Board of the European Synchrotron and Free Electron Laser User Organisation (ESUO).
Dr. Bo Svensson, founder, Director, in silico discovery
Dr. Bo Svensson, co-founder of SARomics Biostructures AB, has worked in the field of computational chemistry and in silico drug discovery within the pharmaceutical industry for more than 20 years. He has developed the proprietary ProPHECY technology for in silico optimization of biomolecular properties. Dr. Svensson has also worked as a researcher and consultant within the food industry and has participated in several international research projects. Dr. Bo Svensson obtained his Ph.D. in theoretical physical chemistry from the Lund Institute of Technology and did his post-doctoral studies at the University of New South Wales.
Prof. Salam Al-Karadaghi, founder, Director Marketing and Business Development
Dr. Salam Al-Karadaghi, co-founder of SARomics Biostructures, has extensive experience in structural biology and structure-based drug design. Dr. Al-Karadaghi has collaborated with Active Biotech on a structure-based drug discovery project focused on DHODH and has been part of a drug discovery program targeting enzymes from tropical parasites. He has also coordinated EU-funded projects KINOMED and TAKTIC, both aimed at developing kinase inhibitors. Dr. Salam Al-Karadaghi has received a Ph.D. in Biophysics from Lomonosov Moscow State University and a Ph.D. in structural chemistry from Stockholm University. In 1993, after a post-doc period at Birkbeck College, University of London, Dr. Al-Karadaghi joined the structural biology group at Lund University. Between 2005 and 2021, he has been a professor of molecular biophysics at Lund University. Currently, he is focused on marketing and business development at SARomics Biostructures.
Prof. Mikael Akke, founder, Director NMR Services
Dr. Mikael Akke, born 1961. M.Sc. Chemical Engineering, LTH, 1987. Ph.D. Physical Chemistry, Lund University, 1993. Professor of Physical Chemistry at Lund University since 2005. Akke has extensive international research experience from the University of California, San Diego, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, and Columbia University, New York. He received several prestigious awards, including the Göran Gustafsson Prize in Chemistry, awarded by The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and a Visiting Professorship at Ecole Normale Superieur, Paris. Akke is an expert in biomolecular NMR spectroscopy and its use to study structure-function-dynamics relationships of proteins. His current research includes fundamental studies of the driving forces underlying ligand binding.
Dr. Kenth Hallberg,Vice President of Sales
Dr. Kenth Hallberg, Vice President of Sales. Dr. Kenth Hallberg has over 15 years of experience in structure-based drug design and project management from the pharmaceutical industry. He has previously worked as a protein crystallographer at AstraZeneca, participating in many structure- and fragment-based drug design projects. In addition, he is one of the co-founders of Sprint Bioscience, a small biotech in Stockholm focusing on fragment-based drug discovery. Dr. Hallberg obtained his Ph.D. in molecular biology and X-ray crystallography from the Swedish Agricultural University in Uppsala and performed an EMBO fellowship post-doc at CNRS, Marseille, France.