Pivotal BioSciences Inc.

In 1969, while playing rugby at the University of California, Los Angeles, Francis Markland, PhD, then an assistant professor at the school, separated his shoulder. The resident who saw him had been reading about the anti-coagulant effects of a thrombin-like enzyme from rattlesnakes, which piqued Markland's interest in herpetologic venoms and enzymes. "In effect, we started a collaboration from my hospital bed," Markland recalls. The encounter started Markland's 30-year search for therapeutic compounds derived from snake venom, including his discovery of fibrolase, an enzyme whose development has been funded by Amgen Inc.

For the most part, the pharmaceutical industry's interest in snake-venom derived compounds has centered on their platelet-inhibiting properties. Markland, however,...