Panacea Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Appoints Ambassador Diana Lady Dougan to its Board of Directors

GAITHERSBURG, Md., July 7 /PRNewswire/ -- Panacea Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is pleased to announce the election of Ambassador Diana Lady Dougan to its Board of Directors. Ambassador Dougan will be taking the place of Ginger S. Johnson, PhD, who has completed her three-year term.

Ambassador Dougan's career spans more than 30 years in senior management, technology and foreign policy positions including appointments by both Republican and Democratic Presidents in full U.S. Senate confirmed positions.

"It's a pleasure to welcome Ambassador Dougan to our Board of Directors. Her vast and diverse experience in technology, foreign policy, and international business development and cooperation will facilitate our global partnering strategy," stated Hossein A. Ghanbari, PhD, Chairman, CEO, and Chief Scientific Officer of the Company. "On behalf of our Board, management, and investors, we also wish to thank Ginger for her efforts and contributions the last three years."

Ambassador Dougan spearheads a diversity of government-industry initiatives involving information technology, policy, and application issues internationally. She is currently Chairman of the Cyber Century Forum (501c3); Senior Advisor at the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS), one of America's pre-eminent think tanks based in Washington, D.C.; and Co-chair of the Governing Board of the Center for Information Infrastructure & Economic Development (CIIED) based in Beijing under the auspices of the prestigious Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS).

During her six years as the first statutory U.S. Coordinator for International Communications and Information Policy and administratively as Assistant Secretary of State from 1982-1988, Ambassador Dougan oversaw international telecom, broadcast, and information technology policy interests on behalf of 14 federal agencies. She spearheaded a wide range of organizational and policy reforms including: competition in international satellites, international credit card protocols, the OECD Trans border Data Declaration, HDTV production standards, international frequency allocations, expansion of U.S. industry involvement in multi-lateral negotiations, and the establishment of ministerial bilateral agreements with all major U.S. trading partners. She was granted the permanent rank of Ambassador for her service in this capacity. As founder of the Global Information Infrastructure Commission (GIIC) in cooperation with the World Bank in 1994, Ambassador Dougan launched the first major global initiative to strengthen private sector leadership and developing country involvement in advancing the role of telecommunications, information technologies and services in fostering sustainable development.

Current boards or international advisory positions include: Qualcomm, Fortis, Centillium, U of California's Graduate School of International Relations, World Affairs Council, Toyota Motor Corp, IREX (International Research Exchange Board), the Prime Minister of Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor International Advisory Panel, Schools Online, the new MIT Journal on Information Technology and International Development, the Department of Public Enterprise for the Republic of Ireland and the newly formed U.S. State Department Advisory Task Force on Public Diplomacy in the Arab and Muslim World.

Early in her career, Ambassador Dougan worked in commercial, cable and public broadcasting. At age twenty-three she became Time Inc.'s youngest executive and first CATV Marketing Director (now AOL-Time Warner). Ambassador Dougan is an award winning television producer including The Nutcracker and the PBS/NPR special: The MX Debate with Bill Moyers, which won the 1981 Peabody Award "for excellence in broadcast journalism." As a Director of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting under appointments by both Presidents Ford and Carter from 1976-1982, she was involved in the development of the first broadcast satellite network and significantly expanded the programming and funding base for PBS and NPR. Other media activities have included Chairman, Editorial Advisory Board Christian Science Monitor TV, a co-founder of the International Media Fund, and the organizing committee of the Sundance Institute.

Ambassador Dougan is called on extensively to speak internationally and has authored or edited over thirty publications dealing with global market, policy, and political dynamics of information technologies and services. Her opinion articles have been published in a number of newspapers including the NEW YORK TIMES, INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE, CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR, LOS ANGELES TIMES, and KNIGHT RIDDER Newspapers. Her public service and professional leadership accomplishments have been honored by many awards including: the Distinguished Service to Journalism Award (University of Utah), National Security Agency Medal, the Outstanding Women in Communications Award, AAUW's Utah Women of the Year, WETA, Outstanding Young Women in America and Distinguished Citizen of Maryland (Governor's Award). In 1965 she was given the Key to the City of Seoul and made an honorary citizen of Korea. She is also active with the Council on Foreign Relations, Council of American Ambassadors, and the Cosmos Club. A graduate of the University of Maryland in industrial psychology, she pursued additional studies at the University of Utah in Economics and the Harvard Advanced Management Program.

About Panacea Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Panacea Pharmaceuticals, Inc. is an emerging biopharmaceutical company focused on utilizing functional genomics and proteomics to develop therapeutics and diagnostics for diseases with substantial unmet clinical need. The Company's product development focus is on novel proteins and biochemical pathways related to cellular regulation and cell cycle abnormalities in oncology as well as both acute and chronic neurodegenerative conditions such as hypoxia-induced cognitive impairment, Parkinson's disease, and Alzheimer's disease. The Company signed a Collaboration & License Agreement with MedImmune, Inc. in early 2002 to discover, develop, and commercialize therapeutic agents for the prevention or treatment of human disease based on Panacea's HAAH technology or its pathways. The Company's wholly owned subsidiary, Proteus Diagnostics, Inc., will be developing in vitro diagnostics including pharmacogenomic and pharmacoproteomic tools for cancer detection, diagnosis, prognosis, treatment selection, and follow-up.

More information is available at http://www.PanaceaPharma.com .

Except for historical information presented in this press release, matters discussed herein may constitute "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward- looking statements are based on the opinions and estimates of management only as of the date of this release and are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from any future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such statements. Factors that might cause such a difference include, but are not limited to, uncertainties related to our access to capital, the progress, costs, and results of any clinical trials undertaken by us, progress of our research and development projects, and uncertainties related to whether our product candidates would ultimately achieve commercial success. We do not undertake any obligation to update publicly any forward-looking statement, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise unless required by law.