Team & Partners

Professor of Structural Biology and Drug Discovery. University of Manchester. Leading the structural and functional characterisation of pathogen targets for drug development. She has >30 years experience in drug discovery at University of Manchester, Purdue University (USA) & Bristol-Myers Squibb (USA). Involved in development of thrombin inhibitors, cholesterol-lowering statins and DNA minor groove antibiotics. She is world-leader in phosphatase functional/structural characterisation, and responsible for drug development programmes targeting mycobacterial phosphatases MptpB and SapM, critical for intracellular survival in the host. She designed novel inhibitors that reduce infection of mycobacteria (TB, NTM) in vivo. This work led to important collaborations with pharmaceutical companies (Abbott Laboratories, GSK, RedX, Evotec, F2G, LifeArc). The discovery of the MptpB inhibitors formed the basis of the new spin-out company, TaBrix Ltd. Her discoveries had high impact in the research community (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8867-455X) and in the media (MEN news, BBC documentary, BBC World Service Radio, Daily Telegraph), and she raised >£12m in funding.

Prof. Tabernero has participated in numerous international consortia and organisations (including EC-COST Action- ADVANCE-TB; EC-FP7-NOFUN, EC-FP6-PTPNET, NTM Network-UK, STOP TB Partnership, Working Group on New Drugs for TB, Mycobacterium tuberculosis Structural Biology Consortium, USA) and served on numerous national and international scientific panels (Royal Society, Science Research Foundation of Ireland, Research Funding Agency AGAUR, Spain).

Christopher Darlow is a Clinical Lecturer and Infectious Diseases and Medical Microbiology physician currently working at the University of Liverpool. He is an expert in pre-clinical pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic (PK/PD) characterisation of antimicrobials using a variety of in vitro, in vivo and in silico methodologies. He has experience of applications of these across a range of bacterial and fungal pathogens.

Notable highlights of recent work include identification and PK/PD characterisation of antimicrobial combinations used to inform a global neonatal sepsis trial (NeoSep1), demonstration of antagonism of the novel antifungal olorofim in in vivo conditions, and demonstration of the use of combination antibiotics to prevent emergence of resistance in pre-clinical models of hospital-acquired pneumonia.

Senior Consultant, Drug Development & Access, Global Health, Infectious Diseases with ≥ 25 years of experience in the pharmaceutical & biotechnology industry with expertise in drug development & access in various therapeutic areas including infectious tropical diseases. Efficiently led cross-functional, multinational & multidisciplinary global drug development, registration and launch/access programs. Managed global alliances and high-performing teams that successfully delivered market registration and access of innovative drugs and patient access worldwide.

Former Head of Neglected Tropical Diseases Drug Development, MERCK KGaA; Senior Consultant Regulatory Affairs & Drug Development ELKOBIO, Senior Program Lead, Global Development & Medical MERCK SERONO and Regulatory Affairs Manager, Global Regulatory Affairs SERONO INTERNATIONAL S.A. 

Thomas Gorsuch is a respiratory physician in Leighton Hospital (Crewe, Mid Cheshire) and Manchester Royal Infirmary (Manchester). He is a specialist in tuberculosis and non-tuberculous mycobacterial infection and has an interest in respiratory infections in immunocompromised people and respiratory complications of stem cell transplantation. He is one of very few Respiratory physicians in the UK with the Diploma in HIV Medicine. He trained in Cambridge, London, Manchester and with Professor Peter Ormerod in Lancashire, and worked in Hlabisa Hospital in South Africa.

He has recently been an investigator for several therapeutic trials for COVID-19 and TRiBE (a study assessing value of Xpert Ultra in bronchoscopy and EBUS) and is a co-applicant on TB-DILI (an NIHR-funded RCT of TB therapy following treatment interruption due to drug-induced liver injury).

Dr. Kreiswirth is a Member of the Center for Discovery and Innovation at Hackensack Meridian Health, an adjunct faculty member of the Department of Medicine at New York University, a lecturer at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University, and a visiting professor at the Museum of Natural History.  Dr Kreiswirth earned his Ph.D. in Microbiology characterizing the genetic basis of the S. aureus toxic shock syndrome toxin.

His career as a molecular epidemiologist spanned 41 years at the Public Health Research Institute where he focused on understanding the spread of antibiotic resistant bacterial pathogens in hospitals and in the community. The laboratories experience advancing public health programs led to the creation of the Tuberculosis Center to study the molecular epidemiology of TB and to work closely with the CDC and the Health Departments of NYC and New Jersey to control the spread of tuberculosis The center characterized the highly multidrug resistant strain W and created the largest M. tuberculosis strain and DNA fingerprint library in the US. The laboratory has extended their public health experience to work with local hospitals to respond to the emergence of carbapenem resistant Enterobacteriaceae, multidrug resistant M. abscessus infections and to use whole genome sequencing to unravel their epidemiology. 

Dr. Kreiswirth has over 480 peer review publications, is an editor and reviewer of numerous infectious disease journals and has appeared in National Geographic and on 60 minutes.

Tom Parr, PhD, has more than 35 years drug discovery experience across both large pharmaceutical and small biotechnology companies. Prior to joining Spero, Dr. Parr was the Chief Scientific Officer at Fedora Pharmaceuticals where the company moved novel diazabicyclooctane beta-lacramase inhibitors toward development partnerships. Prior to Fedora he was the Chief Scientific Officer at Targanta Therapeutics, now part of The Medicines Company. While at Targanta, Dr. Parr was instrumental in progressing the lipoglycopeptide, oritavancin through Phase 3 trials to registration with the FDA. Dr. Parr has worked on a broad range of marketed antibiotics including beta-lactams (cefaclor, loracarbef, cefuroxime axetil, cephalexin, moxalactam, ceftazidime, cefazolin, RWJ-333441); glycopeptides (vancomycin and oritavancin); lipodepsipeptides (daptomycin); aminoglycosides (tobramycin); quinolones (cinoxacin); macrolides (dirythromycin); antimicrobial peptides (iseganins); and a variety of additional developmental candidates.

Dr. Parr earned his PhD from the University of Calgary and conducted a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of British Columbia. He was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Biochemistry at the University of Ottawa before beginning his drug discovery and development career.