Jesse Smith, PhD

Jesse Smith joined NextRNA in 2024 as Chief Scientific Officer. Jesse has over 20 years of drug discovery and development experience with a deep focus on advancing first-in-class targeted small molecule therapies. Before joining NextRNA, Jesse was the CSO at Civetta Therapeutics, a Deerfield-backed company focused on drugging Beta Propeller proteins for therapeutic intervention in oncology and other therapeutic areas. Previously, Jesse was SVP of Translational Biology at Remix Therapeutics, a Cambridge-based biotech company focused on drugging RNA processing to target drivers of human disease. Jesse helped initiate a first-in-class MYB mRNA degrader program, which is currently in early oncology clinical trials. Jesse’s experience also includes a decade in epigenetic drug discovery, most notably as VP of Biology at Epizyme Pharmaceuticals, where he made important contributions to the first-in-class EZH2 inhibitor, Tazverik® and to the first two arginine methyltransferase inhibitors to enter clinical development. Jesse received his Ph.D. in Molecular Cancer Biology from Duke University Medical Center and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute, NIH.