Our Mission

Rahul Ballal, PhD

CEO

Rahul is a biotech executive with more than 15 years of experience in building companies, business development, and company financing. Rahul previously served as Imara’s (IMRA) president and chief executive officer from Series A, through an IPO, raising $200MM in capital and completing a merger with Enliven Therapeutics (ELVN) . Prior to this role at Imara, he served as chief business officer of Northern Biologics and as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Versant Ventures.  Previously, Rahul was vice president of business development at Flexion Therapeutics (FLXN) and an associate at ASM ventures. Additionally, Rahul serves on the Board of Directors of Agios Pharmaceuticals (AGIO), Enliven Therapeutics (ELVN) and Vaderis Therapeutics AG.  Rahul holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Georgetown University, an MS in bioinformatics from Johns Hopkins University and a BS in biology from Brown University.

Paul Yaworsky, PhD

CSO

Paul Yaworsky is the founding CSO of Mediar Therapeutics. He joined Mediar from Pfizer, where he spent more than 20 years focused on drug discovery and development. At Pfizer, Paul created the initial scientific and business plan for fibrosis research. Most recently, he served as COO, Inflammation & Immunology Research, where he led strategy and operations for the research unit from early discovery into the clinic including first-in-human through Phase 2 proof-of-concept for both biologic and small molecule approaches for Inflammation and Immunology assets.

A native of Canada, Paul holds a PhD in Molecular Neuroscience from the Mayo Clinic Graduate School of Biomedicine and a BSc in Molecular Genetics from the University of Toronto.

Jeff Bornstein, MD

CMO

Jeff Bornstein joined Mediar as the CMO in July of 2023, after a drug development career spanning more than 20 years. He was part of the team at Elan that helped launch Tysabri and part of the liver development group at Gilead that launched Sovaldi.  At Gilead, he had the opportunity to lead the development of several anti-fibrotic agents in liver indications including NASH and PSC. Jeff did additional work in fibrosis at Biogen, where he oversaw a program in IPF. He also spent time at several start-ups including Ocera Therapeutics and Tioga Pharmaceuticals, and at Takeda Pharmaceuticals where he served as the head of clinical development for the gastroenterology division. Most recently, Jeff served as the CMO of Eledon Pharmaceuticals.

A hepatologist by training, Jeff attended McGill University for medical school and his residency in internal medicine. He subsequently completed a gastroenterology fellowship at Duke University, with a focus on hepatology. Prior to joining the biopharmaceutical industry, he was on the faculty at Duke in the Department of Medicine.