Sharad Verma, Ph.D.

In his current role at NCI/DCTD as a Special Assistant,  Dr. Verma oversees small molecule therapeutics development projects conducted by the Developmental Therapeutics Program (DTP) in conjunction with extramural sponsors.  In addition, he steers search and evalution efforts for promising NCI funded projects from academia for further NCI supported development through the Stepping-Stones Program.  Prior to his current role, he served as a program director overseeing preclinical therapeutics grants, and as Acting Deputy Associate Director of DTP.  Before joining the NCI, Dr. Verma was on the medicine faculty at The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, where he focused on accelerating the development of therapeutics for neurofibromatosis, Before that, he worked in the pharmaceutical industry for more than 15 years (Bayer and GlaxoSmithKline), serving in various R&D leadership roles to support the discovery and early clinical development of anti-cancer therapeutics. He obtained a BS from the University of California, San Diego and a PhD in Chemistry from the University of California, Irvine. He was an NIH Postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley.