Dr. Axelrod is a registered patent agent who prepares and prosecutes patent applications and provides assistance in the preparation of validity, non-infringement, freedom-to-operate and patentability opinions, as well as litigation and interference proceedings. She concentrates primarily on the biotech and pharmaceutical arts. She provides patent-related services for academic researchers at universities and research institutes, small and medium-sized biotech companies and multinational pharmaceutical corporations. Dr. Axelrod participates in strategic portfolio development for small and large start-up companies; recent companies have specialized in high throughput chip technology, synthetic genomics, and therapeutic and diagnostic procedures based on proteomic analysis. She has assisted several Nobel Prize winners.

Significant Matters

Dr. Axelrod obtained a Ph.D. degree from Harvard University, under the direction of Nobel Prize winner James D. Watson. She then worked for a number of years as a research scientist and teacher of undergraduate and graduate level courses at a variety of universities and research institutes, including Harvard University, The Salk Institute, the University of Connecticut Medical School and Columbia University. Her research areas included aspects of gene regulation in DNA tumor viruses and molecular parasitology. She has a number of scientific publications in these areas and was the recipient of grants and fellowships from, for example, The Medical Foundation, NIH, American Cancer Society and Merck. She subsequently served as manuscript editor at Nature Medicine and as an examiner in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, where she examined applications concerning gene therapy, transgenic animals, stem cells, nuclear transfer technology and antisense oligonucleotides.

Dr. Axelrod has prepared and/or prosecuted applications in many scientific areas, including, for example, high throughput gene chip technology; novel genes, splice variants and mutants, and methods of using them; novel cloning methods; expression profiling; cell surface receptors; miscellaneous immunology; including microbial vaccines, DNA vaccines, and protein or peptide-based vaccines; signal transduction modulators; gene therapy, including methods of treating specific conditions and novel vectors; neurosciences, including brain imaging, methods of diagnosing and treating neurodegenerative diseases, and methods and compounds for enhancing long term memory; infectious diseases, including identifying virulence genes of mycobacteria (tuberculosis) and mycobacterial vaccines; various treatments for HIV infection; methods of diagnosing and treating cancers; medical implants; wound healing compositions; transgenic animals (including mice, insects and zebrafish) and plants; aspects of synthetic genomics; diagnostic and therapeutic applications based on proteomic analysis; compositions for treating steroid-mediated conditions, including methods of birth control, hormone replacement therapy, and treatment of endometriosis, preeclampsia, and the like; novel pharmaceutical agents, including small molecules, such as steroids and specific receptor inhibitors; and pharmaceutical formulations, including sustained release formulations, transdermal patches, formulations for aerosol delivery, stabilizing agents, and others.

This varied experience as a research scientist, teacher, science editor, patent examiner, and patent agent provides her with an appreciation of the needs of a wide range of inventors and clients, and allows her to work closely with inventors who are involved in a variety of sophisticated technologies.