Allegro Diagnostics Appoints Clinical and Scientific Advisory Board

Allegro Diagnostics has announced the formation of its Clinical and Scientific Advisory Board. Allegro has developed a molecular testing platform that utilizes gene expression of normal epithelial cells in the respiratory tract to detect early signs of lung cancer.

"Our advisory board is comprised of some of the most respected and prolific clinicians, researchers and pioneers in the fields of pulmonary medicine, lung cancer and cancer diagnostics," said Michael D. Webb, President and Chief Executive Officer of Allegro Diagnostics. "These individuals will play a central role in advising Allegro on its research and development efforts, as well as on the product development strategy for the BronchoGen(TM) genomic test, which is approaching commercialization."

The members of the advisory board are:

-- Jerome Brody, M.D., Professor of Medicine and Director of the Pulmonary Center at the Boston University School of Medicine -- Dr. Brody has extensive experience in pulmonary and gene expression research and his research interests include gene expression in smokers and non-smokers, as well as the effects of smoking on airway epithelial cells.

-- Armin Ernst, M.D., M.H.C.M., Professor of Medicine at Tufts School of Medicine and Chief of the Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine at St. Elizabeth's Medical Center -- Dr. Ernst's clinical interests include interventional pulmonology and new technology development to treat chest disease and lung cancer.

-- J. Scott Ferguson, M.D., Associate Professor, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health -- Dr. Ferguson is a pulmonary and critical care medicine physician with UW Health, and serves as director of the UW Health Interventional Pulmonology Program, where he is involved with using advanced diagnostics and procedures to evaluate, stage and ultimately treat pulmonary cancers.

-- Gerard Silvestri, M.D., Professor, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the Medical University of South Carolina -- Dr. Silvestri's clinical interests include lung cancer and interventional pulmonary medicine.

-- Avrum Spira, M.D., M.Sc., Alexander Graham Bell Professor in Health Care Entrepreneurship and Chief of the Division of Computational Biomedicine at the Boston University School of Medicine -- Dr. Spira is an attending physician with the Pulmonary/Critical Care Interventional service at Boston Medical Center, where his research is focused on applying high-throughput genomic and bioinformatics tools to the translational study of lung cancer and emphysema.

-- Anil Vachani, M.D., Assistant Professor of Medicine, Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Division at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine -- Dr. Vachani's research is focused on the detection of lung cancer and mesothelioma blood biomarkers through the use of novel proteomic and genomic technologies, as well as on the molecular epidemiology of lung cancer.