Leadership

Dr. Campbell joined Axial Therapeutics in 2017 and was appointed the company’s Chief Executive Officer in February 2021. Dr. Campbell has played a fundamental role in the company’s growth and strategy over the last 46 years. He brings nearly 30 years of experience leading and building teams that have strong track records of discovering and developing novel therapeutics for the patients who need them. Prior to joining Axial, Dr. Campbell held various leadership roles at biopharmaceutical and chemical manufacturing companies, including Corden Pharma, Surface Logix and Insmed Inc. At Corden Pharma, Dr. Campbell served as Head of Product Management and Business Development for Carbohydrates and Lipids and as Head of Operations for Corden Pharma’s Woburn, MA manufacturing site. Prior to Corden Pharma, Dr. Campbell served as Vice President of R&D at Ancora Pharmaceuticals, successfully triaging the company through the acquisition and integration process by Corden Pharma. While at Surface Logix and Insmed, he played an integral role in the discovery and development of five clinical-stage drug candidates, including the Rho kinase inhibitor belumosudil (Rezurock™) and TAK-607 (rIGF-1/BP-3). During his career, Dr. Campbell has been a co-inventor on more than 20 issued patents.

He holds a B.S. with Honors in Chemistry from St. Francis Xavier University, a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the Queen’s University (Canada) and completed his post-doctoral research at Duke University.

Mr. Young brings over 20 years of finance and capital markets experience, an extensive background in financial planning and operations, management and strategy, and a deep knowledge of the life sciences sector. Mr. Young most recently served as CFO, Treasurer and Secretary at Juniper Pharmaceuticals, Inc., where he played an instrumental role in Juniper’s acquisition by Catalent. Prior to that, Mr. Young served as CFO and Treasurer of OvaScience, a global fertility company focused on new treatment options for women. Mr. Young was previously the CFO and Treasurer of Transmedics, a developer of medical devices for the maintenance and transport of organs between donors and recipients. Before that, he served as CFO and Treasurer at Lantheus Medical Imaging, where he led and managed multiple public debt offerings. Mr. Young began his career holding various positions of increasing responsibility in finance at Critical Therapeutics, PerkinElmer, Inc. and PriceWaterhouseCoopers LLP.  Mr. Young holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from Georgetown University. 

Dr. Gabriel Belfort joined Axial in June 2022. He is a central nervous system (CNS)-focused physician-scientist with neuroscience research expertise and more than a decade of industry experience dedicated to advancing the clinical development of novel medicines to treat CNS disorders. Prior to joining Axial, Dr. Belfort was Vice President of Clinical Development Sciences at Praxis Precision Medicines, Inc. Previous roles include CNS Area Physician, Clinical Translational Science at Takeda, and roles of increasing responsibility in research at Sage Therapeutics. Dr. Belfort received his MD and PhD from the Boston University School of Medicine, trained as a resident in Neurology at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in molecular and behavioral neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

Dr. Senter joined Axial in January 2022, bringing expertise in drug discovery and extensive experience leading non-clinical pharmacology, pharmacokinetics, and toxicology efforts to identify and validate therapeutic targets and drive development programs to IND and through clinical development. Prior to Axial, Dr. Senter held roles of increasing responsibility at Flexion Therapeutics, most recently as Director, Non-clinical and Translational Research. She completed her postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the Picower Institute of Learning and Memory. Dr. Senter received her Ph.D. in Pharmacology from Vanderbilt University’s School of Medicine, and a Bachelor of Science degree from St. Lawrence University.

Mrs. Bourdon joined Axial in August 2022, bringing 16 years of clinical operational experience. Prior to Axial, Mrs. Bourdon held numerous clinical operational roles, most recently as Director, Clinical Operations & Data Management at Scipher Medicine. Prior to Scipher, she held roles of increasing responsibility at Sarepta Therapeutics, AbbVie and Quintiles. Mrs. Bourdon holds a Bachelor of Science degree with a major in Biology and a minor in Psychology from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. 

Dr. Oalmann joined Axial in July 2018, and brings nearly 30 years of experience experience in medicinal chemistry leadership with a successful record of delivering development candidates for oncology, metabolic, immuno-oncology, pulmonary and auto-inflammatory disease targets. Prior to joining Axial, he was Director of Medicinal Chemistry at Flatley Discovery Lab. Earlier in his career, he also worked at Ensemble Therapeutics, SIRTRIS, a GSK Company, GPC Biotech and ProScript, Inc. Dr. Oalmann completed his post-doctoral work at North Carolina State University, received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Texas, and a Bachelor of Science degree from Louisiana State University.

Ms. Zeghibe joined Axial in 2023 with expertise in business development, new product planning and global drug development. Prior to joining Axial, she was a Digital Strategy and Partnering Lead at Sanofi where she led a digital strategy planning exercise to restructure governance and program management of global commercial digital initiatives across Sanofi top 12 markets. Prior to Sanofi, she held roles of increasing responsibility in program and portfolio management at Sage Therapeutics including overseeing their first FDA New Drug Application and Advisory Committee experiences. Earlier in her career, Ms. Zeghibe worked in clinical research at both MediVector, Inc., and the Dana Farber Cancer Institute. She completed her MBA at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, and earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology with a concentration in Social and Cognitive Neuroscience from Harvard University.