Meet CellTrans

José Oberholzer, MD, MHCM, FACS, founded CellTrans Inc. and is the President of the company. Dr. Oberholzer is Department Chair of Visceral and Transplant Surgery at University Hospital, Zurich and an Adjunct Professor of Surgery and Endocrinology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Raised in Switzerland, he earned his medical degree from the University of Zurich Medical School and completed his residency at the University of Geneva, where he later led the Human Islet Transplantation Program. He was a fellow in hepatobiliary and pancreatic surgery and transplantation at the University of Alberta in Canada. He also earned a master’s degree in healthcare management from the Harvard School of Public Health. He has performed over 1,000 transplant-related surgeries and is an expert in liver, kidney, pancreas and small bowel transplants, as well as organ transplants in patients with diabetes. In addition to his clinical practice, Dr. Oberholzer specializes in islet transplantation and parathyroid transplantation, as well as vascular access for hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis catheter placements. He practices minimal invasive, robotic assisted surgery, including robotic kidney and pancreas transplantation, living donor nephrectomy, adrenalectomy, liver and pancreas surgery and hernia surgery. He is a fellow of the American College of Surgeons, a member of the American Surgical Association, American Society of Transplant Surgeons, the American Medical Association, and the American Diabetes Association, and a founding member of the Clinical Robotic Surgery Association. He has published more than 250 peer-reviewed articles and is a frequent presenter at national and international conferences. Additionally, he is the founder and coordinator of the Chicago Diabetes Project, an international research collaboration for a functional cure for diabetes. His overall focus is to remove barriers to transplantation and improve access for those in need.

James McGarrigle, Ph.D., holds the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO) at CellTrans Inc. With over 13 years of experience in the field of biologics drug development and manufacture, he brings a wealth of knowledge in both operational excellence and strategic management. Dr. McGarrigle oversees the operational processes related to the manufacture of human pancreatic islet cells (LANTIDRA) for the treatment of Type 1 diabetes within a cGMP-compliant facility, ensuring the biologics meets the highest standards of functionality and safety. Dr. McGarrigle identifies areas for continuous process improvement to develop scalable and effective cGMP-compliant manufacturing processes. He provides strategic direction, tactical oversight, and technical expertise for all activities in product/process development and manufacturing, while also coordinating interactions between manufacturing and clinical personnel.
Prior to joining CellTrans Inc., Dr. McGarrigle served as an Assistant Research Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Department of Surgery. There, he evaluated various cell therapies and biomaterials for diabetes treatment and worked on research projects aimed at improving human islet manufacturing and transplantation. Originally from Ireland, he earned a bachelor’s degree in microbiology and biochemistry and a Ph.D. in microbiology, both from the National University of Ireland, Galway.

Giovanna La Monica, PhD serves as the Chief Quality Officer at CellTrans Inc., where she ensures compliance with external and internal requirements for the manufacture of isolated pancreatic islets (LANTIDRA) for transplantation. She is responsible for maintaining the quality of CellTrans operations and services. Dr. La Monica coordinates a current Good Manufacturing Practice (cGMP) facility for the production of LANTIDRA for transplantation in type 1 diabetic patients. Her role includes ensuring consistent production quality by developing and enforcing cGMP standards, validating processes, managing staff, and supporting all internal and external audits. Dr. La Monica has a strong understanding of FDA requirements for biological products, with extensive experience in regulatory submissions and navigating complex regulatory pathways. Dr. La Monica earned her PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of Naples (Italy). With a background in oncology, immunology, and molecular and cell biology, she has over 15 years of experience, acquired at the Department of Biochemistry and Medical Biotechnology (DBBM) at the University “Federico II” in Naples, Italy, as well as at Northwestern University and UIC in Chicago.

Dr. Peter Rios obtained his PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Northwestern University and BS in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Virginia (UVA). His PhD dissertation focused on islet encapsulation for diabetes and ovarian follicle encapsulation for fertility preservation. Currently, he serves as the Chief Scientific Officer of CellTrans, Inc. In this role, he is responsible for planning, coordinating, and managing the activities of multiple bioengineering and biomaterials-focused projects in the Research Department. He undertakes short-term and long-term planning and supervision of preclinical and clinical-focused projects aimed towards sustainable treatments for diabetes. Prior to CellTrans, he served as a Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Department of Surgery, where he led several rodent and non-human primate research studies to evaluate biomaterial products to treat diabetes. Prior to his graduate studies, he worked for Booz Allen Hamilton in Washington DC on bioterrorism projects for the Department of Homeland Security. Outside of his professional work, he is an active Lifetime member of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (SHPE) for over 10 years, an organization dedicated to advancing diversity in STEM, and has served in numerous leadership roles including on SHPE's National Board of Directors.

Jenny Cook is the Chief Financial Officer and manages finance and administration for CellTrans Inc. In her role, Jenny is involved in grant administration, contracting, purchasing, human resources, budgeting, financial reporting and corporate formalities. Jenny has gained broad regulatory knowledge serving as a coordinator of the islet cell transplant clinical trials at UIC and throughout the Biologic License Application and review process ultimately resulting in FDA approved Lantidra. She has led Lantidra market access efforts through preparation of coding applications (CPT and ICD-10) and documents to inform insurance coverage policies (AMCP Dossier, white paper, etc.) She is a Certified Public Accountant and has a BS in Accounting. Prior to working at CellTrans, Jenny provided administrative support for the transplant program at UIC. Before joining the islet team at UIC, she gained more than 20 years of experience in corporate, nonprofit and university accounting.

Dr. Wang is the Vice President of CellTrans. He is an Associate Professor at the University of Virginia and an expert in the field of beta-cell physiology and islet transplantation with nearly 20 years of research experience. With his medical training background, Dr. Wang’s research interest is to investigate and solve clinically relevant problems with novel emerging technologies. Dr. Wang has developed a set of novel microfluidic biochips (Islet-On-Chip) to study islet physiology that are applied in human islet transplantation and beta-cell biology. His research represents one of only a handful of laboratories that have applied microfluidic technology in diabetes research and treatment with more than 20 peer-reviewed research publications, technical reports, reviews, and book chapter in this area since 2009, including Lab-On-Chip, Analytical Chemistry, Nature Immunology, Nature Biomaterials, Nature Biomedical Engineering, Cell Metabolism, and Diabetes. He is also developing additional islet devices such as microfluidic array for high-content and high-resolution imaging, pumpless microfluidic perifusion, integrated optical imaging with smartphone, and beta-cell and alpha-cell separation. His research has been supported by NIH, JDRF, Pfizer, Merck and Gift of Hope. Dr. Wang also has extensive experience in islet isolation and transplantation including human, non-human primate, and rodent animal models.

Ying Liu, Ph.D., is the Chief Technology Officer of the company. Dr. Liu holds the Dr. Satish C. & Asha Saxena Chair Professorship and serves as the Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC). Additionally, she is affiliated with the Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Pharmaceutical Sciences at UIC.

Ying Liu’s academic journey is marked by interdisciplinary training. She received her B.S. in Engineering Mechanics from Tsinghua University in Beijing, China in 2001, followed by her Ph.D. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University in 2007. Notably, she was offered a tenure-track assistant professor position by UIC in 2006 before her graduation from Princeton University. Before officially joining UIC in 2008, Ying Liu deferred her position and spent a year as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Chicago in the Department of Chemistry and James Frank Institute. Throughout her career, Dr. Liu has been recognized with several prestigious awards, including Howard Carthoren Phillips Graduate Fellowship of Princeton University (2003), National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2014), UIC Researcher and Scholar of the Year Award (2016), UIC Graduate Mentor Award (2017), and Faculty and Student Team Research Award at NSF’s ChemMatCARS (2019). Dr. Liu has published more than 50 peer-reviewed articles, authored two book chapters, and held the inventorship for 10 patents and published PCTs.

Dr. Liu’s expertise lies in the fields of soft-matter physics and biophysics. Specifically, through her in-depth understanding of molecular interfacial packing, interactions, reactions, and self-assembly, Dr. Liu takes the lead in developing knowledge-based designs for bioreactors and biomaterials, with a particular focus on drug and therapeutic cell delivery. Within the Liu research group, several scalable, continuous, and self-assembling processes have been developed to enable the high-throughput screening and mass production of well-controlled nano- and microparticles, meticulously engineered for precise targeting delivery and sustained release of small molecular compounds, macromolecules, and therapeutic cells.

Ira Joshi serves as a Principal Scientist at CellTrans,Inc. In her role, Ira is involved in testing cells and biomaterials using both in vitro and in vivo assays for preclinical studies. She is also a member of the human islet isolation team. Ira earned her MS in Biotechnology from Rush University, Chicago, and also has an integrated Master's and Bachelor's of Science degree in Biotechnology from Veer Narmad South Gujarat University, India. Prior to working at Celltrans, Ira worked as Research Specialist in the Department of Surgery at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She also has research experience in India at a biofertilizer, bioremediation and wastewater treatment-based company.

Sofia Ghani is the Quality Manager at CellTrans, Inc. Sofia supports the development and implementation of CellTrans quality practices to assure compliance of the human pancreatic islet manufacture process with internal and external regulations. She coordinates, together with the Director of Quality, all QA/QC activities at CellTrans Inc., works to develop and validate quality processes, establish product specifications and quality attributes, and develops operation and performance qualifications. She is also involved in the quality control testing of human pancreatic islets for transplantation and in the development of the staff training program for Quality Control testing and the Quality System. Sofia has a BS in Biochemistry from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

David Cook is a Facility Manager and Quality Control Specialist at CellTrans. He is a member of the human pancreatic islet isolation team and manages the cGMP Islet Isolation Facility that produces Lantidra. David has a BS and MS in Chemical Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Daisy Lopez is a Senior Research and Manufacturing Associate at Cell Trans, Inc. In her role, she is responsible for performing experimental research as well as being part of the human Islet isolation team. Previously she worked as a Medical Laboratory Technician, at UIC and Loyola for 3 years, and as a Medical Assistant and Health Educator for a non-profit organization in Chicago. Daisy has a BA in Health Sciences from Rush University, and Graduate education in Biomedical Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology.

Hafsa Nasir is a Senior Research Associate and Quality Control Specialist at CellTrans, Inc. Hafsa is involved in multiple research Projects Involving testing of cells and biomaterials. She is also involved in quality control testing of human pancreatic islets for transplantation. Previously she was part of internship programs during her academic years. Hafsa has a BS in Biological Sciences from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She speaks three languages and halfway learning a fourth one.

Quetzalli Rodriguez is a Manufacturing and Research Associate and Raw Material Quality Control Specialist at CellTrans. She has a BS degree from University of Illinois at Chicago majoring in Biomedical Engineering. She plans to attend medical school in the near future. Her current interests in medicine include surgery and internal medicine.

In her free time, Quetzalli enjoys reading medical memoirs and spending time with her family.

Yvette Calvillo is a Manufacturing and Research Associate at CellTrans Inc. She is a member of the human pancreatic islet manufacture team, as well as the Research team. Her responsibilities include assisting with the production of Lantidra Allogeneic Pancreatic Islet Cellular Suspension, as well as assisting with experimental research projects.
Yvette earned her BS in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, as well as her MS in Biotechnology from Northwestern University. Prior to working at CellTrans, Yvette gained research experience as a research associate in the Joester Lab, located at Northwestern University. She also gained biotechnology industry experience as a Research Analyst, working at Charles River Laboratories, Skokie.

Yi Li serves as a Biostatistician at CellTrans. In her role, Yi is involved in research design, statistical analysis planning and clinical data management. Yi has nearly 15 years of experience working in the field of health sciences, research methodology and data analytics.