Board Members

Elected 2014

Richard H. Scheller joined 23andMe in 2015 as chief scientific officer and head of therapeutics. Under his leadership, 23andMe built a dedicated research and therapeutic development team that uses human genetic data as the starting point for identifying novel therapies for common and rare diseases. In early 2019, Scheller retired from his position at 23andMe and was appointed to the board of directors. In addition to 23andMe, Scheller serves as chairman of research and development and on the board of directors at BridgeBio Pharma, DiCE Molecules (chairman), ORIC Pharmaceuticals, Rafael Pharmaceuticals, Alector, and Maze Therapeutics.

An expert and enthusiastic collector of traditional and historical African art, Scheller serves as a member of the board of trustees at The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

During 14 years at Genentech, Scheller was executive vice president and head of Genentech Research and Early Development, and member of both the Genentech and Roche executive committees. Prior to joining Genentech, Scheller was a professor of biological sciences at Stanford University (1982–1994) and was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator at the Stanford University School of Medicine from 1994 to 2001. Scheller has been an adjunct professor of biochemistry and biophysics at UC San Francisco since 2004. He has published more than 200 research papers.

Scheller holds a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a PhD in chemistry from Caltech. He was a postdoctoral fellow in Caltech's Division of Biology and a postdoctoral fellow in molecular neurobiology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons.

Scheller's research elucidating the molecular machinery and regulatory mechanism that underlies neurotransmitter release earned him the 1997 U.S. National Academy of Sciences Award in Molecular Biology, the 2010 Kavli Prize in Neuroscience, and the 2013 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award.

Scheller is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and a member of the National Academy of Medicine.

Standing Committee: Technology Transfer and Innovation