Daniel Zurr, Ph.D. Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer
Daniel Zurr Ph.D., CEO, Founder and Chairman of the Board. Dr. Zurr also serves as a Director of QBI, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Quark Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Zurr has extensive experience in senior research and business management in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries.
Prior to establishing Quark, Dr. Zurr was the CEO of Plantex-Ikapharm, then the second largest pharmaceutical company in Israel with more than 300 employees and marketing offices in the United States, Europe and Japan, focused in the field of bulk active ingredients and finished dosage pharmaceuticals. During Dr. Zurr’s tenure, Plantex Ikapharm, now part of the Teva group of companies, became the first Israeli company ever to be inspected and found to be in compliance with US standards for GMP. In the early 1980s, Dr. Zurr served as the Director of Licensing at G.D. Searle in Skokie, Illinois, where he was responsible for the major collaborative agreement between G.D. Searle and Meiji Seika Kaisha (Tokyo), involving the licensing of several drugs and recombinant DNA technology transfer. Dr. Zurr was also responsible for numerous other agreements, including those with Bayer AG (Leverkusen), Ono Pharmaceutical (Osaka) and May and Baker (London). Dr. Zurr received his M.Sc. at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his Ph.D. from the Imperial College University of London under the guidance of the Nobel Laureate Professor D.H.R. Barton.

Tomer Natan, LLM, BB, CPA, Chief Financial Officer
Tomer Natan, LLM, BB, CPA, Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Natan possesses over 10 years of finance experience. He joined Quark Pharmaceuticals in 2005. Prior to his current position at Quark, Mr. Natan served as Senior Director of Finance for Quark from 2005 through 2011. Prior to joining Quark, Mr. Natan served as Senior auditor at Ernst & Young Israel. Mr. Natan received his Master of Law from Bar-Ilan University, is a Bachelor of Business specializing in accounting from the College of Management, and is a certified public accountant in Israel.

Rami Skaliter, Ph.D. Chief Operating Officer
Rami Skaliter PhD., COO. Dr. Rami Skaliter joined Quark in 1995. Since then he has assumed different executive roles including Vice President and Executive Vice President of Research & Development. Under his leadership, Quark’s research and development unit generated most of its current product pipeline. Dr. Skaliter obtained his B.Sc. in Biology at the Ben-Gurion University and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Biochemistry at the Weizmann Institute in Israel. He specialized in the biochemistry of replication and mutagenesis mechanisms. Between 1993 and 1995, prior to joining Quark, Dr. Skaliter completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Stanford University. Dr. Skaliter’s previous experience managing large organizations of up to several thousand people has benefitted Quark significantly.

Shai Erlich, Ph.D., Chief Medical Officer
Shai Erlich, Ph.D.,CMO. Dr. Erlich joined Quark in 1999 and since then has assumed several executive positions including Director of Portfolio Management and Product Development Strategic Planning. Dr. Erlich completed his studies at the School of Medicine at Ben Gurion University in Israel, and holds an M.Sc. in cancer genetics from the department of Human Genetics, Tel Aviv University, and a Ph.D. in Gene Therapy from the Department of Human Genetics, Mt Sinai Graduate School for Biomedical Sciences at the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine, New York.

Elena Feinstein, MD, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer
Elena Feinstein, MD, PhD., CSO. Dr. Feinstein joined Quark in 1998, and since has held increasingly senior positions, including Director of Research and Development, Vice President of Research and Vice President of Technology Development. Prior to joining Quark, Dr Feinstein worked for 12 years in the Weizmann Institute of Science as Doctoral Fellow, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Scientist and Senior Staff Scientist. She has a 2-year practical clinical experience from Clinical Pediatric Hospital No.1 in Moscow, Russia. Dr. Feinstein obtained her M.D. degree from the 2nd Moscow Medical Institute (Moscow Medical University) and completed her Ph.D. studies (Bondi Prize for Excellence) in the Department of Chemical Immunology, the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel. Dr. Feinstein has been a leading or senior author of numerous publications in peer-reviewed journals and is named as an inventor on numerous patents.

Juliana Friedmann, M.Sc., Senior Vice President of Strategy and Planning
Juliana Friedmann, M.Sc., Senior VP of Strategy and Planning. Ms. Friedmann joined Quark (QBI) in 1998. Throughout her career of over 20 years, Ms. Friedmann’s experience has focused on intellectual property, marketing, business development and strategic planning activities in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. In 1983, Ms. Friedmann joined Dead Sea Bromine, of Israel Chemicals Ltd. (ICL), the largest chemical conglomerate in Israel. From 1983 until she joined Quark in 1998, Ms. Friedmann held a number of progressively senior positions including managing organic fine chemical products serving the life science industries, a major biocide joint venture with the U.S. leader in the field and directing business and new product development activities. Previously Ms. Friedmann worked as a Patent Attorney in Milan, Italy, at one of Italy’s largest patent firms with offices in Germany. Ms. Friedmann received her B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Chemical Engineering from Ben Gurion University, Israel.  

Hagit Ashus, Ph.D. Vice President Research Operations
Hagit Ashush, Ph.D., VP Research Operations. Dr. Ashush joined Quark Pharmaceuticals in 2001. During these years, she served in several senior positions as a Project Director in the research division. Dr. Ashush received a Ph.D. in Biology from Bar-Ilan University in Israel.

Lilly Glazer, Ph.D., Vice President Intellectual Property
Lilly Glazer, Ph.D, VP Intellectual Property. Dr. Glazer brings to Quark nine years of in-house and patent firm practice in addition to twenty years of molecular biology research experience. She trained as a Patent Attorney in Israel and interned at Heslin, Rothenberg, Farley and Mesiti in Albany, NY. Dr. Glazer has experience in patent drafting, freedom to operate and patentability analyses, and strategic advice and has provided these services to a variety of clients including start-up pharma and biotech companies as well as big pharma. An American who has resided in Israel since 1979, Dr. Glazer obtained a B.Sc. degree at Cornell University and M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from the Weizmann Institute of Science. She is registered to practice as a Patent Agent before the USPTO and as a Patent Attorney in Israel.

Jennifer Hodge, Vice President, Clinical Operations.
Jennifer Hodge, Vice President, Clinical Operations. Prior to joining Quark, Ms Hodge held a variety of positions of increasing responsibility in clinical operations, project management, alliance management and strategic planning at Otsuka, Solvay, Quintiles and CV Therapeutics (now Gilead).  Most recently, she was Vice President of Development at Nile Therapeutics.  Ms. Hodge received her Bachelor of Science degree in Pharmacology from The University of Edinburgh, Scotland, UK.

Elizabeth Squiers, M.D., F.A.C.S., R.A.C., Vice President, Pharmacovigilance
Elizabeth C. Squiers M.D., F.A.C.S., R.A.C., Deputy Chief Medical Officer. Dr. Squiers joined Quark in 2009, assuming the executive role of Vice President of Pharmacovigilance in 2010. Prior to joining Quark, Dr. Squiers held positions as Chief Medical Officer at Y’s Therapeutics, VP at Thios Pharmaceuticals and Genzyme Corp. and multiple positions in senior management at SangStat Medical Corporation. Most recently, Dr. Squiers was an independent consultant at Pacific BioDevelopment, LLC. Dr. Squiers received her B.S. degree in Science from Pennsylvania State University and her M.D. degree from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, PA, and was Assistant Professor of the Jefferson Medical College while at the Geisinger Medical Center, Pennsylvania, and Associate Professor of Surgery and the Director of Transplantation Program at State University of New York. She was recertified in General Surgery in 2009, and received Regulatory Affairs Certification (RAC).

James D. Thompson, Ph.D. Vice President Pharmaceutical Development
James D. Thompson, Ph.D., VP Pharmaceutical Development. Prior to joining Quark, Dr. Thompson was Director of Research & Development at Genta, Inc., and before this was Director, Biology Research at Ribozyme Pharmaceuticals/Sirna Therapeutics. Dr. Thompson received a B.S. in Biology from Temple University and a Ph.D. in Biological Chemistry from Hahnemann University in Philadelphia.