Dr Marianna Lalla

OxSonics Therapeutics has announced the appointment of Dr Marianna Lalla as CMO. Marianna, a well-respected physician with significant experience in leading clinical trials, will head the company’s clinical development function to drive the development of SonoTran, in combination with multiple anti-cancer therapies.

SonoTran is designed to increase the dose and distribution of anti-cancer agents within solid tumours, thereby increasing the efficacy and reducing the toxicity of these agents.

Dr Marianna joins OxSonics from UCB, where she was the Global Clinical Development lead in Translational medicine, and responsible for the development of multiple early clinical-stage products.

Dr Marianna Lalla commented: “I’m excited to join OxSonics as it starts to generate data from the ongoing first-in-man clinical trial and I look forward to the forthcoming initiation of further SonoTran combination clinical studies.

“There is a desperate need for new technologies to address the performance limitations of current drugs, and I believe SonoTran has the potential to overcome one of the major challenges in treating solid cancers – getting more anti-cancer therapy into the tumour tissue. Its unique mechanism of action will be of great interest to potential partners looking to increase the efficacy and therapeutic index of their candidates.”