Cambridge, Mass.-based Mersana Therapeutics Inc. appointed Willard Dere as an independent director of the company.

Dere, who is a professor at the University of Utah Health Sciences Center, has over three decades of research, clinical and regulatory biopharmaceutical leadership experience. He is the former chief medical officer of Amgen and has also served Eli Lilly and Co. in a number of leadership positions, Mersana said in a statement.