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Spine treatment technology developer InVivo Therapeutics Holdings Corp. has tapped Dr. Edward Wirth to be the Cambridge company’s new chief science officer as of Dec. 5, 2011.
Wirth, described in a press release as “one of the world’s foremost experts” in spinal cord injury (SCI) and regenerative medicine, was the lead on the world’s first human embryonic stem cell clinical trial as medical director for regenerative medicine at Geron Corp., according to InVivo. Now, Wirth will lead the first human clinical study for acute SCI using InVivo’s proprietary scaffold system without drugs or cells.
Prior to Geron, Wirth was a doctor at Rush-Presbyterian St. Luke’s Medical Center and at the University of Chicago. From 1997 to 2002, he led the team at the University of Florida that performed the first human embryonic spinal cord tissue transplants in the United States, InVivo said in the release. Wirth received a Ph.D. in neuroscience and an M.D. from the University of Florida, and earned a bachelor of arts in physics from Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla.
Wirth said in the release that he was “honored to join a group of world renowned scientists including 2008 Millennium Laureate Bob Langer and 1993 Nobel Laureate Sir Richard Roberts.” I am focused on lending my expertise toward further development of this revolutionary technology. It has already shown outstanding promise in the lab, and in my opinion has enormous clinical potential.”
Founded in 2005, InVivo (OTCBB: NVIV) uses spine treatment technology co-invented by MIT professor Langer and Massachusetts General Hospital affiliate Joseph P. Vacanti. In July, the company named Jonathan Slotkin, who has served as a member of the company’s scientific advisory board for three years, as its new medical director. The company announced in May that it had formed a strategic research collaboration with The University of Miami Miller School of Medicine’s Miami Project to Cure Paralysis.
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