Ordaōs Announces Appointment of Ziwei Liang, PhD to Role of Chief Science Officer

NEW YORK, Dec. 15, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Ordaōs, a biotechnology company designing novel mini-proteins to help drug hunters deliver life-saving treatments, today announced that company co-founder Ziwei Liang, PhD, has been elevated to the role of Chief Science Officer for this emerging biotech company. In this position, Dr. Liang will drive the drug discovery strategy, manage the multiple research programs, and lead a team of machine learning and AI scientists to develop an internal in silico pipeline for de novo protein generation.

"Ziwei embodies that rare blend of a scientist with creative passion that inspires her team to innovate and develop the engine (and systems) that will transform the development of mini-proteins for Ordaōs and their partners," said David Longo, CEO of Ordaōs. "As our company enters a time of rapid evolution, having Ziwei's leadership, inventiveness and contagious enthusiasm will be critical to our progress.

Dr. Liang has a strong scientific background and expertise in translational research and medicine and the application of bioinformatics analyses. She also has deep experience in antibody discovery and oncology cell therapy and has successfully led programs from early discovery into efficacious animal studies. At Ordaōs, she is applying her keen understanding of machine learning and its novel application to protein therapeutic design and the creation of mini-proteins.

"I am thrilled to take on this position to further Ordaōs' mission and scientific leadership role in creating novel mini-proteins," said Dr. Liang. "It's an extremely exciting time for our industry and company as we at Ordaōs help our pharma and biotech partners deliver safer and more effective therapeutics in a fraction of the time with the novel power of our AI-designed miniPRO™ proteins."

Prior to being the Director of R&D and Co-Founder at Ordaos, Dr. Liang was a senior scientist at GlaxoSmithKline. She also worked at the Tri-Institutional Therapeutic Discovery Institute where she made key contributions in multiple antibody discovery and oncology cell therapy programs. Dr. Liang obtained a BSc from Harbin Institute of Technology in Biotechnology, and a PhD and Postdoctoral degree from the Imperial College London in Epigenetics.

The Ordaōs Design Engine Ordaōs uses The Ordaōs Design Engine, to deliver true protein property design - leveraging continuous learning loops and proprietary data sets to translate human-targeted product criteria into machine-designed mini-proteins. Starting with amino acids, the Design Engine generates, appraises, and ranks billions of protein sequences and hundreds of thousands of protein structures and properties to create customized miniPRO™ proteins. These proteins are then rapidly evaluated in vitro to provide intelligent feedback on multiple design objectives including protein structure, binding specificity and affinity, solubility, stability, immunogenicity, and developability. This iterative process delivers optimized mini-proteins to meet the client's specific molecular target product profile (mTPP). They are also less likely to cause adverse side effects and are easier and less expensive to test, develop, and manufacture than traditional proteins. Using this approach, the Ordaōs Design Engine creates more ideal, unseen protein leads than others and can accelerate drug candidate development, increasing the probability of more therapeutically effective candidates. All of this provides clients with a high level of confidence in their investigational new drug (IND) applications.

Media Contact: Ryan Wagner (Ryan.wagner@ogilvy.com)

About Ordaōs Ordaōs is a human-enabled, machine-driven drug design company that helps birth novel therapies to reduce patient suffering, improve health, and extend life. Our flagship solution, miniPRO™ mini-proteins, enable drug hunters to deliver safer and more effective treatments in a fraction of the time of traditional discovery methods.