Andrea van Elsas, Ph.D. joined LAVA Therapeutics as chair of the scientific advisory board In April 2018. He is a venture partner with Third Rock Ventures and chief scientific officer at Abata Therapeutics. Previously, Dr. van Elsas served as chief scientific officer at Aduro Biotech following the acquisition of BioNovion, a company he co-founded in 2011. From 1999 to 2011, he held various positions at Organon (acquired by Schering-Plough and later by Merck) in Oss, The Netherlands, and Cambridge, Mass. He directed the immuno-oncology portfolio and led the anti-PD1 program that later became known as pembrolizumab. As a postdoctoral researcher, Dr. van Elsas worked in the lab of 2018 Nobel Laureate Jim Allison at the University of California, Berkeley and is a co-inventor on the original anti-CTLA-4 patents that formed the basis for the development of ipilimumab, the first checkpoint inhibitor approved in 2011 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of melanoma. Dr. van Elsas earned a doctor of philosophy degree in immunology and oncology from the University of Leiden in The Netherlands.