The Jackson Laboratory (JAX) has named Lon Cardon, Ph.D., FMedSci, a pioneer in human genetics and drug discovery, its next president and chief executive officer.
Dr. Cardon will take the helm at JAX, a MCG client, on November 29 to succeed current President and CEO Edison Liu, who is stepping down after 10 years.
Dr. Cardon’s background
Cardon received his Ph.D. from the University of Colorado and conducted his postdoctoral research in the Department of Mathematics at Stanford University.
He spent the first half of his career as a senior academic in the United Kingdom and United States, initially as professor of Bioinformatics at the University of Oxford and then as professor of Biostatistics at the University of Washington and co-chair of the Herbold Bioinformatics Program at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.
After his time in academia, he led a 14-year career in industry. He was a senior vice president at GlaxoSmithKline, leading departments and divisions spanning genetics, molecular biology, computational biology, statistics and epidemiology, and ultimately leading an early-to-late pipeline division called Alternative Discovery and Development.
Cardon then joined BioMarin in September 2017 as chief scientific officer and senior vice president. He was promoted in 2019 to chief scientific strategy officer to enrich BioMarin’s pipeline.
His vision for JAX
At JAX, Cardon will develop and drive a clear, integrated strategy for the Laboratory’s continued long-term success. He plans on leveraging the unique and powerful interplay of JAX’s deep expertise in mammalian genetics and human genomics combined with the latest advances in digital technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and new computation platforms. Cardon will also continue to advance JAX’s research, educational, and business strengths.
As Cardon puts it, “For many years there has been immense promise to translate human genetics and genomics discoveries into new diagnostics, prognostics and treatments for both common and rare diseases,” he says. “Many of the foundational pieces are finally coming into place. The next step is to put them together to begin to realize this promise.”