# Sotirios Karathanasis

> Sotirios Karathanasis is a Greek-born biochemist and drug-discovery executive whose career spans Harvard Medical School, Pfizer, Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca and Enveda. Now a Founding Fellow at Enveda, he has brought decades of cardiovascular and metabolic research to the effort to translate the largely unmapped chemistry of nature into medicines using metabolomics, automation and machine learning.

- **Role:** Founding Fellow at Enveda
- **Organizations:** Enveda, Eli Lilly, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Harvard Medical School
- **From:** Greece
- **Education:** Chemistry studies, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Ph.D. in Biochemistry, University of Georgia, Postdoctoral fellowship, Harvard Medical School
- **Known for:** Holds 23 patents and has published more than 100 original manuscripts, reviews and book chapters., Led drug-discovery teams of as many as 250 scientists across multiple locations and disciplines., Conducted early academic work connecting genetics, lipoprotein metabolism and cardiovascular biology.

## Career timeline

- **Early career** — Completed postdoctoral work at Harvard Medical School and later became an associate professor, studying metabolism and the genetic basis of lipoprotein biology.
- **Pharmaceutical R&D** — Moved into industry and became Director of Cardiovascular Pharmacology at Pfizer Global Research & Development.
- **Later** — Served as Chief Science Officer for endocrine and cardiovascular research at Lilly Research Laboratories.
- **Later** — Became Vice President and Head of Biosciences at AstraZeneca, leading a team of approximately 250 scientists in Gothenburg.
- **2023** — Joined Enveda as Chief Science Officer to lead its small-molecule portfolio and preclinical work.
- **2024** — Public executive records listed him as a Founding Fellow at Enveda.
- **2026** — Was listed as an inventor on Enveda patent publications concerning isoandrographolide analogs.

## Achievements

- Holds 23 patents and has published more than 100 original manuscripts, reviews and book chapters.
- Led drug-discovery teams of as many as 250 scientists across multiple locations and disciplines.
- Conducted early academic work connecting genetics, lipoprotein metabolism and cardiovascular biology.
- Received an Established Investigator Award from the American Heart Association in 1985.
- Helped direct cardiovascular and metabolic drug-discovery programs at Pfizer, Eli Lilly and AstraZeneca.
- Contributed to Enveda’s effort to turn natural-product chemistry into clinical and preclinical drug candidates.

## Latest updates

- **2026-09** — Enveda raised a $311 million Series E after reporting early clinical readouts from medicines discovered with its PRISM platform; Karathanasis’s current public title is Founding Fellow.
- **2026-03** — Patent publications named Karathanasis among the inventors of Enveda work on isoandrographolide analogs.
- **2024-07** — Public executive records listed him as Founding Fellow at Enveda, following his tenure as Chief Science Officer.

## Links

- Website: https://enveda.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sotirios-karathanasis

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/sotirios-karathanasis
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-09-28