Prof. Christian Schafmeister
Founder and Inventor of Spiroligomer™ molecules
Christian is the President, CSO, and Founder of ThirdLaw Molecular LLC, focusing on the development of Spiroligomer™ molecules for drug and diagnostic innovation. He also serves as a Chemistry Professor at Temple University. An acclaimed AMBER software developer, Christian has been pivotal in advancing biomolecular simulations for over 30 years worldwide. He notably synthesized the first artificial protein, 4HB1, as a graduate student and co-invented “stapled peptides” during his post-doctoral research. With two decades dedicated to Spiroligomer™ molecules, he has significantly scaled up their production with the Department of Defense and Energy’s backing. Through ThirdLaw Molecular LLC, Christian aims to revolutionize therapeutics and diagnostics with Spiroligomer™ technology.
Leadership
JD Northrup
Principal Scientist
JD is the Principal Scientist at ThirdLaw Molecular, and has been with the company since its founding in 2020. He has worked on Spiroligomer™ molecules for over a decade. JD received his PhD in Organic Chemistry at Temple University in 2016, where he authored numerous papers with Christian Schafmeister on the development of Spiroligomer™ molecules and their chemistries. He did his postdoctoral work with Mark Sellmyer in the Department of Radiology at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, working on chemical biology and radiochemistry. During this time, he also pursued a course in translational research, receiving a certificate from the UPenn Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics.
J. David Owens
Director
David is the President & CEO of BiologicsMD, an early-stage drug development company, and a Founding Partner for Bowman’s Tower Venture Partners, a venture capital group founded in 2022 to assist entrepreneur leaders in advancing their early-stage life-science companies. Previous roles include Co-CEO & Board Director of OrthogenRx, Inc. (sold to Avanos in 2022), Chief Business Officer of Novira Therapeutics, Inc. (sold to J&J in 2015), Senior Vice President and Business Unit Head of the Surgical Products Division at King Pharmaceuticals (now Pfizer), Vice President of Global Marketing & Medical Affairs at Aventis Pharma (now Sanofi), and other commercial positions at Genentech, Merck and Abbott Labs. David has been an active private investor and angel investor since 2009 and was previously a member of the Mid-Atlantic Angel Group Fund II and the Delaware Crossing Investor Group.
Dr. Barry Arkles
Director
Dr. Barry Arkles has a record of accomplishment in applied materials science, surface chemistry and biotechnology both from the innovation and managerial perspective that can be noted in contributions to a variety of applications including thermoplastic composites, the NASA Space Shuttle, Contact Lenses, Interlayer Dielectrics and Metallization used in integrated semiconductor devices, and Gene Chips for DNA array analysis. Today the companies that he founded or cofounded generate nearly $1,000,000,000 in annual revenue: LNP Engineering Thermoplastics, Petrarch Systems Inc., and Gelest Inc, now part of SABIC Basic Industries, Evonik, and Mitsubishi Chemical, Inc, respectively. He has published over 150 technical articles and has been granted over 100 patents. He has been elected to the National Academy of Engineers and elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He has received numerous awards including the John Scott Medal, ACS Kipping Award in Silicon Chemistry, the R&D 100 Award for contributions to semiconductors.