2 March 2021 - - US-based biotechnology company Rome Therapeutics has appointed Scott Biller, Ph.D., to the Rome board of directors, the company said.

A chemist by training, Dr. Biller has more than three decades of experience in drug discovery and development, most recently as chief scientific officer at Agios Pharmaceuticals.

He has also held leadership positions at Novartis Pharmaceuticals (NYSE: NVS) and Bristol Myers Squibb (NYSE: BMY).

Biller currently serves as a strategic advisor to Agios Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: AGIO), after nearly a decade as the company's chief scientific officer.

During his tenure as CSO, he advanced seven molecules into the clinic, leading to two marketed therapies and multiple late-stage candidates.

He previously served as vice president and Head of Global Discovery Chemistry at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research and as vice president, Pharmaceutical Candidate Optimization at the Bristol Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute.

He also serves as a member of the Scientific advisory board at Denali Therapeutics (NASDAQ: DNLI), and a member of the board of directors at Foghorn Therapeutics and Remix Therapeutics. Dr. Biller earned a B.S. in chemistry at MIT, a Ph.D. in organic chemistry at Caltech and was an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow at Columbia University.

Rome Therapeutics is developing novel therapies for cancer and autoimmune diseases by harnessing the power of the repeatome vast stretches of uncharted genetic material that have long been dismissed as "junk DNA."

With several drug targets identified and multiple discovery programs underway, Rome is moving rapidly to leverage this new frontier in biology.

Rome was launched in April 2020 and was incubated at GV, in collaboration with ARCH Venture Partners and Partners Innovation Fund. Rome is based in Cambridge, Mass.