Announcement Formation Scientific Advisory Board
Cantoni Therapeutics announces the Formation of Scientific Advisory Board
Leiden, The Netherlands, May 12, 2025 – Cantoni Therapeutics BV (‘Cantoni’), a preclinical-stage pharmaceutical company dedicated to the development of best-in-class small molecule inhibitors of nicotinamide N-methyltransferase (NNMT) for obesity and its comorbidities, today announced the establishment of its Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) comprising distinguished international scientific, translational and clinical leaders in metabolic diseases. The SAB, chaired by Scientific Founder Professor Nathaniel Martin, will work closely with Cantoni’s executive team to advance its potent and differentiated NNMT inhibitors through preclinical and early clinical development.
Annegret Van der Aa, PhD, CEO & Executive Director of Cantoni commented: “The establishment of this SAB marks a significant step for Cantoni Therapeutics, as we further progress our NNMT program towards patients suffering from obesity and its many comorbidities using a well-differentiated approach from the currently approved therapies.“
“I am privileged to welcome the members of our newly formed SAB, each bringing deep, internationally recognized expertise on both the pharmacology of our target as well as relevant clinical insights in the way to better treat obesity and its comorbidities. We look forward to collaborating with them as we drive our NNMT program forward”, says Matthijs van Haren, PhD, Scientific Founder and CSO of Cantoni.
Professor Nathaniel Martin, PhD, Scientific Founder of Cantoni and appointed as Chairman of the SAB added: “I am delighted to welcome Barbara, Roman, Aimo and Bruno on Cantoni’s SAB and look forward to continue supporting the company in its aim to bring their NNMT inhibitors to patients with obesity, where there is still a high unmet need for alternative therapies with improved characteristics over incretin-based therapies.”
The members of Cantoni’s Scientific Advisory Board are listed below.
Nathaniel Martin, PhD, Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board
Nathaniel Martin is Professor of Biological Chemistry within the Institute of Biology Leiden at Leiden University (the Netherlands). For more than a decade Prof. Martin’s group has been at the forefront of NNMT biochemistry, pioneering the first potent and selective small molecule NNMT inhibitors. Prof. Martin has received a number of prestigious grants and awards in support of his research from the European Research Council (ERC) and the Dutch Science Foundation (NWO). To date, Prof. Martin has published 138 peer-reviewed research papers and is named inventor on 10 patents. Since 2023 Prof. Martin is also associate editor for the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry.
Barbara Kahn, MD, MS
Dr. Barbara B. Kahn is an endocrinologist and the George Richards Minot professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School (US). She is also the Vice Chair for Research Strategy in the department of medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and former Chief of the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism. She received the Banting Medal from the American Diabetes Association and the Gerald Aurbach Award from the Endocrine Society. In 2025, she will receive the Albert Renold Award from the American Diabetes Association and the Roy Greep Award from the Endocrine Society. She is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Roman Vangoitsenhoven, MD, PhD
Dr. Roman Vangoitsenhoven is Assistant Professor at KU (Catholic University) Leuven (Belgium) and a clinical endocrinologist at UZ (University Hospital) Leuven, with a special interest in obesity and type 2 diabetes. His research work has been awarded by the Belgian Endocrine Society with the Young Investigator Award, by the European Association for the Study of Obesity with the New Investigator Award Basic Science, and the Novo Nordisk prize for Diabetology.
Aimo Kannt, PhD
Aimo Kannt is a biochemist, pharmacologist and Professor of Translational Drug Research at Goethe University Frankfurt (Germany) and Head of Drug Discovery and Preclinical Research at the Fraunhofer Institute for Translational Medicine and Pharmacology. Aimo has more than 20 years of experience as a drug hunter at Sanofi and predecessor companies in R&D for cardiovascular and metabolic diseases. He has made substantial contributions to unraveling the role of NNMT in disease biology and has led major programs to identify and characterize different classes of NNMT inhibitors.
Bruno Guigas, PhD
Bruno Guigas is a molecular biologist and Associate Professor at the Leiden University Medical Center (the Netherlands). His research group is focusing on immunometabolism, aiming to identify new druggable molecules and/or molecular targets involved in the immune regulation of metabolic homeostasis in the context of obesity, type 2 diabetes, MASLD/MASH and infection. Bruno is involved in several international collaborations on multidisciplinary projects dealing with metabolic disorders and has co-authored >120 publications.
About Cantoni Therapeutics B.V.
Cantoni Therapeutics B.V. is a private pharmaceutical company based in Leiden, the Netherlands that is dedicated to the discovery and development of NNMT inhibitors. NNMT is highly expressed in metabolic tissues including the liver, adipose tissue and muscle. NNMT is an attractive drug target for cardiometabolic disease where elevated NNMT levels are correlated with obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Furthermore, targeting the metabolic enzyme also brings opportunities in other indications: a role for NNMT has been described in the development of chronic kidney disease as well as in cancer progression, where it is believed to promote tumor aggressiveness, cancer migration, invasion, and proliferation through epigenetic changes.
Cantoni was founded in December 2022 by Libertatis Ergo Holding B.V. (LEH) and Scientific Founders Professor Nathaniel Martin and Dr. Matthijs van Haren, scientists with an impressive track-record in discovery and optimization of small molecule drug candidates. Cantoni’s Board of Directors consists of CEO & Executive Director Annegret Van der Aa, and Non-Executive Directors Rob Mayfield of LEH and Helmuth van Es, former founder of and executive in several companies including Galapagos, Audion Therapeutics and Citryll, where he was CEO.
About LEH
LEH is an independent seed investor in life science and health companies, which creates, supports and invests in startup and spinout companies connected to the activities of Leiden University, many of which are located on the Leiden Bio Science Park.
Contact:
Annegret Van der Aa, CEO
+32 473 525 648
Cantoni at BioEquity Europe 2025 in Bruges
Cantoni Therapeutics will be present at BioEquity Europe in Bruges as part of our Series A fundraising activities. Connect with us to learn more about our exciting program, developing small molecule inhibitors of NNMT for the treatment of obesity and metabolic disease.