Ravi Kurumbail

Dr. Ravi Kurumbail, Ph.D. is an independent structural biology and biophysics consultant who works with early stage biotechs. Ravi is a consummate drug hunter with a deep passion for innovation. Dr. Kurumbail has had a distinguished career in the pharmaceutical industry with over twenty-five years of experience in structure-based drug design, lead identification and validation and biophysical and mechanistic studies. Through biophysical and structural studies coupled with elegant application of molecular biology techniques, Ravi and his team demonstrated molecular mechanism of action and specificity in over 20 drug discovery projects. Ravi was an active member of the COX-2 project team that discovered Celebrex™, Bextra™, Dynastat™ and Deramaxx™. He has contributed to the discovery of over a dozen clinical candidates. He has a comprehensive knowledge of three-dimensional structures of macromolecules critical for the discovery of drugs and vaccines. Ravi was one of the first crystallographers to solve a membrane-protein structure (COX-2) in the pharmaceutical industry. Dr. Kurumbail helped build a strong biophysics technology platform for validation of lead matter, hit triaging and for molecular mode of action studies. Ravi demonstrated strong scientific and personal leadership as an Executive Director in big Pharma, managing an industry-leading group of approximately 50 scientists and establishing cutting-edge technologies including cryo-EM. He has a strong track record in publications and scientific/technical reviews and is a passionate teacher who has contributed to the drug discovery course at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst for over 10 years.