2016 Archived Content
Speaker Biographies
Immuno-Oncology
Robert
Williams, Ph.D., Chief Drug Development Scientist, Cancer Research UK Centre
for Drug Development
Holbrook E.
Kohrt, MD, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Oncology, Stanford University
Holbrook Kohrt investigates novel therapeutic strategies
to enhance anti-tumor immunity, including the discovery of checkpoint
inhibitors and cancer vaccine strategies. Holbrook Kohrt is the co-director of
the Cancer Immunotherapy Trials Network. As a faculty member at Stanford,
Holbrook Kohrt is developing novel vaccine strategies which induce tumor
antigen-specific immunity and improve graft-versus-tumor reactions without
exacerbation of graft-versus-host disease. His studies also include efforts to
identify and develop immunomodulatory antibodies targeting immune effector cell
subsets, such as natural killer cells, which enhance the anti-tumor activity of
tumor-targeting antibodies. Holbrook Kohrt is a leader in the clinical
development of agents including IL-15, IL-7, anti- CTLA-4, anti-CD137,
anti-PD-1, anti-PD-L1, BTK inhibitors, and HPV-targeted and WT1-targeted
vaccines.
Peter Ellmark, Ph.D., Principal Scientist, Alligator Bioscience
Dr. Ellmark earned his PhD 2002 in Prof. Carl Borrebaecks group at the
Department of Immunotechnology at Lund University, Sweden, working on antibody
engineering with a particular focus on immunotherapy and CD40 antibodies. The
postdoctoral research 2003-2004 in Richard Christopherson’s group at the
University of Sydney, Australia, focused on cancer diagnostic using antibody
microarrays. This area was further pursued the following years as a Research
fellow at Lund University alongside with research into mode of actions of CD40
antibodies. Dr. Ellmark holds an Associate Professor position at Lund
University since 2010. In 2008 Dr. Ellmark joined Alligator Bioscience and as
Principal Scientist has been Responsible for the Research/Discovery phase for
several projects, including ADC-1013. He has more than 15 years of experience
with CD40 antibodies.
Jennifer Michaelson, Ph.D.,
Director, Research, Tumor Biology, Jounce Therapeutics
Jennifer Michaelson is currently Director of Tumor Biology and Program
Leader for the flagship ICOS program at Jounce Therapeutics, a biotech startup
company in Cambridge, MA focused on developing biologics for cancer
immunotherapy. Dr. Michaelson joined the
Jounce team prior to the 2013 launch of the company as a scientific consultant
to Third Rock Ventures. Prior to that, Dr. Michaelson spent a decade at Biogen
Idec where she led monoclonal and bispecific antibody projects in the oncology
and immunology therapeutic areas. An
author on >45 peer reviewed publications, Dr. Michaelson was trained in molecular
immunology (Albert Einstein) and cancer genetics (Harvard Medical
School).
Matt Johnson, Ph.D., CTO, Avacta Life Sciences
Matt Johnson is CTO of Avacta Life Sciences, a company developing a next-generation affinity scaffold called Affimers. Affimers are small, robust and quickly developed protein tools. Binders can be generated against a wide range of targets including proteins, small molecules, lipids and nano-particles. Prior to joining Avacta Matt spent nearly 9 years at Abcam, one of the leading suppliers of research grade antibodies, moving from bench science to Head of R&D.
Andrea Allersdorfer, Senior Group Leader, Protein Analytics, Pieris Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Andrea Allersdorfer is Senior Group Leader of Protein Analytics and Project leader at Pieris Pharmaceuticals.
Ann White, Ph.D., Senior Research Fellow, Faculty of Medicine, Cancer
Sciences Unit, University of Southampton
Ann White is a Senior
Research Fellow within the Cancer Sciences Unit, University of Southampton, UK.
Her research is focused upon optimisation of anti-cancer therapeutic mAb
through the manipulation of mAb structure. Ann received a PhD in Molecular and
Cellular Biology from the MRC Clinical Research Centre, London in 1991. She
then spent 10 years in the US researching lipoprotein metabolism, first in San
Antonio, Texas, then at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at
Dallas. Ann joined Southampton University in 2005 and is part of a large
antibody development programme funded primarily through the charity Cancer
Research UK
Oliver Hill, Ph.D., Vice President Molecular Biology, Apogenix GmbH
Oliver Hill joined Apogenix in March 2006. He is an expert for
protein engineering and expression. Prior to his position at Apogenix, he
headed the protein expression and purification group at Graffinity
Pharmaceutical Design GmbH (Heidelberg, Germany; 1999-2006). His work in
former, academic R&D positions at the Lower Saxony Institute for Peptide
Research (Hannover, Germany; 1992-1996) and the Institute for Molecular
Biotechnology (Jena, Germany; 1997-1998) included gene hunting, protein
engineering and the development of recombinant phage display technologies. Mr
Hill studied biology at the University of Hannover where he also received his
Ph.D. from the Department of Chemistry in 1997.
Brian Soper, Ph.D., Technical Information Scientist, The Jackson Laboratory
Dr. Brian Soper has worked at The Jackson Laboratory for 20 years. He conducted research on treatment strategies for a mouse model of human enzyme deficiency. Approaches included enzyme replacement, gene therapy and modulation of immune tolerance in neonatal allogeneic bone marrow transplantation. He is now a Senior Technical Information Services Scientist. Brian's area of expertise is in modeling type 1 and type 2 diabetes, and research involving human hematopoietic stem cell transplantation in immunodeficient mice.
Sergio A. Quezada, Ph.D., Professorial Research Fellow, UCL Cancer
Institute
Dr. Sergio Quezada is a Professorial Research Fellow and Group Leader
at UCL Cancer Institute in London where he heads the Immune Regulation and Tumour
Immunotherapy Laboratory. Prior to this, Dr. Quezada worked with Dr. James
Allison at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center studying the mechanisms
governing anti-tumour T-cell immunity, and how these mechanisms can be
manipulated for the generation of potent anti-tumour immune responses.
Dr. Quezada’s research interest at UCL remains focused in the study of
the mechanism of action of anti-CTLA-4, anti-PD-1 and other immune-modulatory
antibodies targeting co-inhibitory and co-stimulatory pathways (including ICOS,
4-1BB, OX-40) and used as novel anticancer therapies. His group has particular
interest in the evolution of the immune response to cancer, the impact of
immune-modulatory antibodies in the fate and function of tumour reactive T
cells, and the role that the tumour microenvironment plays in the response and
resistance to such therapies.
Dr Quezada is a Cancer Research UK Career Development fellow and the
recipient of a Cancer Research Institute investigator Award.
Björn Frendéus, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer, BioInvent
International AB
Björn Frendéus is the CSO of BioInvent,
a Swedish biotech company developing therapeutic antibodies for treatment of
cancer. Björn got his PhD studying innate immune responses to microbial
infection. Over the past decades he has developed a strong interest in
understanding the complex biology of antibodies in relation to their targets,
and applying his knowledge to develop better antibody-based medicines. Björn’s
team conceived and developed the F.I.R.S.T™ platform from which BioInvent’s lead clinical programs
ICAM-1 (BI-505) and FcγRIIB (BI-1206) have emerged. Several of BioInvent´s
programs, including FcγRIIB and Treg, are being co-developed with the Cancer
Sciences Division in Southampton, UK, where Björn is an honorary professor.
Björn chairs the Swedish Foundation
for Strategic Research (SSF)’s expert review committee on Infection
Biology.
Nicolai Wagtmann, Ph.D., Chief Science Officer, Innate Pharma
Nicolai Wagtmann, Ph.D, is Executive Vice
President and Chief Science Officer at Innate-Pharma, a biopharmaceutical company
discovering and developing first-in-class therapeutic antibodies for treatment
of cancer and inflammatory diseases. Previously, he spent 14 years in the
R&D organisation at Novo Nordisk, as Vice President and Head of Cancer and
Immunobiology, with responsibilities for building and developing the
therapeutic antibody portfolio. He received his Ph.D. in immunology from the
University of Copenhagen and from 1991-98 held academic appointments at the
National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, MD, and the Center for Immunology in
Marseille, France. During this time, he identified the human inhibitory Killer
Ig-like Receptors (KIR) and other checkpoint receptors that regulate the
activities of cells of the innate immune system. Nicolai Wagtmann is a Danish national,
born April 1963
Mads Hald Andersen, Ph.D., D.Sc. Tech., Professor, Director, Center for
Cancer Immune Therapy, Copenhagen University Hospital
Professor Andersen obtained
his MSc in Chemical Engineering from the Technical University of Denmark. In
2001 he gained his PhD from the Danish Cancer Society, Copenhagen, Denmark, and
the Department of Dermatology, Würzburg University, Germany. The same year he
co-founded the Tumor Immunology Group at the Danish Cancer Society. He obtained
his D.Sc.Tech. in 2006, the same year he co-founded the Center for Cancer
Immune Therapy at Copenhagan University Hospital at Herlev. Professor Andersen
has considerable pharmaceutical experience, and has founded several biotech
companies. He has been honored with several awards during his career including
The Lundbeck Foundation research prize (2012), the Danish Cancer Society
Research Award (2006) and the Hallas-Møller Stipend from the Novo Nordisk
foundation (2007). He has an extensive publication record, authoring over 140
publications in peer reviewed journals, more than 10 patents as well as several
book chapters.
Martin Pule, Ph.D., Senior
Lecturer, Haematology, UCL Cancer Institute
Martin Pule is Clinical Senior Lecturer in the Dept. of Haematology at
UCL Cancer Institute and Honorary Consultant in Haematology at University
College London Hospital. His research is focused on many aspects of
genetic engineering of T-cells for cancer treatment, with a particular focus on
CARs. He entered the T-cell engineering field in 2001 as a traveling Fulbright
Scholar at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy at Baylor College of Medicine,
Houston. Here, Martin Pule was the first to describe third generation forms of
CARs and described one of the first clinical studies of CARS, which showed
efficacy in a solid cancer. Martin Pule is director of the UCL Chimeric Antigen
Receptor (CAR) programme. He holds a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of
Surgery from University College Dublin and is a Fellow of the Royal College of
Pathologists.
Steven P. Lee, Ph.D., Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Immunology and
Immunotherapy, University of Birmingham
Aaron Foster, Ph.D., Senior Director, Product Discovery, R&D,
Bellicum Pharmaceuticals
Dr. Foster is Senior
Director of Product Discovery at Bellicum Pharmaceuticals. He leads the T cell
therapy research group (CAR-T and TCR) that is developing systems for
controlling T cell behavior in vivo
using molecular switches. He received his doctorate in Chemical Engineering
from the University of Sydney and was an Assistant Professor at Baylor College
of Medicine, at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy (CAGT) prior to joining
Bellicum.
Onur Boyman, M.D.,
Professor, Chairman and Director, Immunology University Hospital Zurich
Onur Boyman obtained his M.D. degree from the University of
Zurich, Switzerland. Subsequently, he trained as a postdoctoral fellow in the
laboratory of Jonathan Sprent at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla,
California. In 2006, he joined the Division of Immunology and Allergology of
the University Hospital of Lausanne, Switzerland, as principle investigator and
clinical fellow. In 2010, he obtained a professorship of the Swiss National
Science Foundation. And since 2014, he has been chairman and professor of
clinical immunology at the University of Zurich and director of the Department
of Immunology at University Hospital Zurich. Research in his laboratory focuses
on the modulation of immune responses using cytokine-directed approaches, such
as particular IL-2 formulations to stimulate regulatory versus effector T cells
for selective immunotherapy, as well as pro-inflammatory cytokines and their
inhibitors in chronic inflammatory and autoimmune diseases.
Peter Lowe, Ph.D., Project Leader, Molecular
and Cellular Biology, Institut de Recherche, Pierre Fabre
Following a PhD in genetics from the
University of Aberdeen, Peter began his professional career with Haptogen a
spin off company from the same university developing therapeutic and diagnostic
antibody fragments by phage display. Moving to France he developed an in house
phage display platform for antibody identification and optimisation at the
Centre d'Immunologie Pierre Fabre. He is currently an antibody discovery
project leader focused in oncology. Peter has a number of filed and granted
patents in the field of antibody discovery, humanisation and therapeutic
antibodies.
Joe Conner, Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer, Virttu Biologics Ltd.
I joined Virttu in 2002 and have been Chief Scientific Officer since
2008. I also hold an honorary lectureship at University of Glasgow. I have over
30 years’ experience in scientific research, 25 of which have been associated
with Herpes Simplex Virus and more than 20 years working with oncolytic HSV. I
specialise in molecular virology and cell biology and have substantial
experience in autoimmunity and antibody engineering. I have published
extensively on these topics and I am the author of numerous granted and pending
patents. My qualifications are a B.Sc. in Biochemistry and a Ph.D. in
Biochemistry from the University of Glasgow.
Robert Williams,
Ph.D., Chief Drug Development Scientist, Cancer
Research UK Centre for Drug Development
Dr Robert
Williams is Chief Drug Development Scientist at Cancer Research UK’s Centre for
Drug Development. Dr Williams has worked in drug discovery and development for
over 25 years holding pharmaceutical industry positions in a number of
therapeutic areas with Glaxo Group Research and Rhone-Poulenc Rorer, and spent
4 years in the biotechnology sector before joining Cancer Research UK in 2004.
At Cancer Research UK he has overseen the progression of multiple new drug
candidates, including small molecules, antibodies, vaccines and cell therapies
into early phase cancer trials and more recently has taken on a key role in
managing the joint CRUK-MedImmune antibody discovery alliance. Dr Williams
served as Chairman of the Society for Medicines Research from 2008-2009 and is
a regularly invited speaker at International Drug Discovery and Development
conferences.
Novel Approaches for Cancer
Matthias Friedrich, Ph.D., Director,
Nonclinical Development, Amgen Research (Munich) GmbH
Dr. Friedrich is Scientific Director at Amgen
Research Munich who has been working on bispecific BiTE® antibodies since 2006.
Formerly, he was a group leader at the Institute
for Biochemistry at the University of Frankfurt and did a postdoctoral
fellowship in the Haematology/Oncology department of Weill Medical School of Cornell University,
New York, USA focusing on anti-angiogenic strategies in the treatment of
cancer. Dr. Friedrich studied biology at the
Universities of Muenster and Cologne, Germany and holds an MSc in Applied
Toxicology from the University of Surrey, UK.
Luise Weigand, Ph.D., Team
Lead, Cell Biology, Immunocore Ltd
Dr.
Luise Weigand is Team Leader in Cell Biology and inter-disciplinary project
manager in Immunocore Ltd. She studied molecular biotechnology at the
Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM). In her MSc and PhD thesis she worked on
the development of adoptive T cell therapies using MHC I and MHC II restricted
T cell receptors targeting breast cancer and hematologic malignancies respectively
at Helmholtz Zentrum Muenchen (IMI) and the Klinikum Rechts der Isar (TUM). She
continued in the field of immunotherapy moving to Immunocore Ltd, where she was
leading the T cell cloning group. Luise is currently leading research programs
and coordinating the research pipeline to facilitate delivery of clinical
candidates.
Marina Bacac, Ph.D., Head, Cancer
Immunotherapy, Roche Innovation Center Zurich
Marina
joined Roche in 2010 as Head of the Cell Biology Group and currently leads one
of the Cancer Immunotherapy Departments at the Roche Innovation Center Zurich.
She leads a team of scientists dedicated to the characterisation of the
activity of cancer immunotherapy agents
including T-cell bispecific antibodies (TCBs), immunocytokines and checkpoint
immunomodulators. In addition, Marina leads the discovery activities of the CEA
TCB and other TCB programs. She is also actively involved in tumour immunology
network established between Roche and several academic institutions and pioneers
efforts focused on establishment of superior models for testing of cancer
immunotherapy drugs, based on patient-derived tumour material. Marina
participates in building and overseeing
Roche’s portfolio focused on antibody-based cancer immunotherapeutics. Her
department offers stimulating training opportunities to interns, master’s
students and PhD’s.
She received her PhD in Oncology from the
University of Trieste (Italy) in 2003 working on ruthenium-based antimetastatic
drugs in Ph II clinical trials. In 2001 she was awarded by the Marie Curie
Fellowship and performed part of the PhD at the University of Leiden
(Netherlands). Following the PhD, Marina moved to Lausanne (Switzerland) for
the post-doctoral fellowship at the University Hospital Lausanne (CHUV) working
on projects in the field of tumor-host interaction. She was a pioneer in the
establishment of the laser-capture microdissection (LCM) unit at her Institute
and later on continued to supervise and coordinate its activities. Her work was
awarded by the Keystone Symposia scholarship and was presented at several
international conferences. Marina became a group leader four years later and
has mentored PhD students and coordinated programs dedicated to understanding
of the molecular mechanisms underlying tumor-host interaction and metastasis.
Mark Throsby, Ph.D., Chief Scientific
Officer, Merus BV
Dr.
Mark Throsby joined Merus in October 2008 with responsibility for coordinating
preclinical research and external alliances. Prior to joining Merus, Dr. Throsby
was 8 years at Crucell in various R&D capacities culminating in the role
Director of Antibody R&D from 2006 to 2008. At Crucell, Dr. Throsby was
program leader for therapeutic antibody discovery programs against West Nile
virus, nosocomial bacterial infections and pandemic influenza. Before joining
Crucell Dr. Throsby was an associate investigator with CNRS at Hôpital Necker
in Paris for 4 years and prior to that held an MRC of Canada Post-Doctoral
Fellowship at the University of Toronto. Dr. Throsby graduated in immunology
from Monash University, Melbourne Australia and received his PhD from the
Department of Medicine, Monash University, Australia.
John Haurum, MD, D.Phil., CEO, F-star
Biotechnology Ltd.
John
Haurum joined F-star as the CEO in May 2012. Previously he was VP Research at
ImClone Systems, New York (2010-2012). Before then he was the Chief Scientific
Officer and a cofounder of Symphogen A/S, Denmark (2000-2009).
After graduating in Medicine in Aarhus Denmark in 1992, Dr. Haurum received a D.Phil.
in Immunology from the Institute of Molecular Medicine, John Radcliffe
Hospital, University of Oxford, England. Subsequently, he took up a position as
Associate Professor at the Danish Cancer Society and completed his medical
training.
Marie Kosco-Vilbois,
Ph.D., Chief Scientific Officer, Novimmune SA
Dr
Kosco-Vilbois is the CSO of Novimmune, Geneva, Switzerland, responsible for
developing a pipeline of therapeutic mAbs and bispecific antibodies, five of
which have entered clinical trials and two out licensed (Genentech/Roche &
Tiziana). Currently, oversees the departments of Research, Translational
Medicine and Bioprocess R&D. Prior Industry experience includes
GlaxoWellcome, Serono and Roche, the latter as a scientific member of the Basel
Institute for Immunology. Holds a doctorate in Immunology and Human
Anatomy& Histology from the Medical College of Virginia, USA, and has
published over 140 peer reviewed publications and is a co-inventor on numerous
patents.
Dario
Neri, Ph.D., Professor, Chemistry and Applied Biosciences, Swiss Federal
Institute of Technology (ETH), Zurich
Dario Neri
studied Chemistry at the Scuola Normale Superiore of Pisa and earned a PhD in
Chemistry at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zürich), under the
supervision of Professor Kurt Wüthrich. He then performed post-doctoral
research at the Medical Research Council Centre in Cambridge (UK), under the
supervision of Sir Gregory Winter. He has now been a Professor at the ETH
Zürich since 1996.
The research of
the group Neri focuses on the engineering of therapeutic antibodies for the
therapy of cancer and other angiogenesis-related disorders. Other research
activities include the chemical proteomic discovery of novel vascular markers
of pathology and the development of DNA-encoded chemical libraries. Dario Neri
is a co-founder of Philogen (www.philogen.com), a Swiss-Italian biotech company
which has brought five antibody-based products into multicenter clinical trials
for the therapy of cancer and of rheumatoid arthritis.
Dario Neri has
published over 300 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals. He is the
recipient of the ISOBM Abbott Prize 2000, of the Amgen-Dompe’ Biotec Award
2000, of the Mangia d’Oro 2001, of the Prous Award 2006 of the European
Federation of Medicinal Chemistry, of the Robert-Wenner-Prize 2007 of the Swiss
Cancer League, of the SWISS BRIDGE Award 2008, of the Prix Mentzer of the
French Medicinal Chemistry Society in 2011, of the Phoenix Prize 2014 and of an
ERC Advanced Grant in 2015.
Roland Kontermann, Ph.D.,
Professor, Biomedical Engineering, Cell Biology and Immunology, University of
Stuttgart
Roland Kontermann holds a PhD in Molecular
Biology from the University of Heidelberg. After working as a postdoc in the
laboratory of Sir Gregory Winter at the MRC Centre for Protein Engineering,
Cambridge, UK, group leader at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Tumor
Biology of the University of Marburg, and subsequently Head of Research at
vectron therapeutics AG. Since 2004 Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the
Institute of Cell Biology and Immunology of the University of Stuttgart,
Germany. Current research focuses on the development of recombinant bispecific
and bifunctional antibody molecules, including half-life extension strategies,
for tumor therapy.
John McCafferty, Ph.D., CEO, IONTAS
John
McCafferty was one of the founders of Cambridge Antibody Technology (CAT, now
Medimmune) in 1990 and published the first paper/patent describing antibody
phage display. After 12 years at CAT, John set up groups at the Sanger
Institute and then The University of Cambridge developing and utilising methods
for protein generation and recombinant antibody isolation for research and
therapeutic applications. In 2012 John formed IONTAS, a small innovative
biotechnology company using phage display to develop novel antibody
therapeutics. In addition IONTAS are developing novel technologies allowing
discovery of IgG formatted antibodies directly from very large mammalian
display libraries.
Stefan Dübel, Ph.D., Managing Director and
Professor, Biotechnology, Technische Universität Braunschweig
Stefan
Dübel co-pioneered in vitro antibody selection technologies, resulting in
several key inventions including antibody phage display (USPat. 5849500) or
human antibody libraries with randomised CDRs (USPat. 5840479). His lab
continued to work on multiple topics related to human antibody engineering and
phage display, e.g. Hyperphage technology, RNase fusions, scFab, and
intrabodies. He is editor of the four volume "Handbook of Therapeutic
Antibodies“ (10/2014) and co-founder of the human antibody company Yumab. He is
Full Professor of Biotechnology and Director of the respective department at the Technische
Universität Braunschweig, Germany.
Peer Heine, Ph.D., Field Application Scientist, MaxCyte. Inc.
James Baker, Ph.D., Senior Lecturer,
Chemistry, UCL
Dr James Baker is a senior lecturer in
Chemistry at University College London, UK. His research interests are in the
development and application of novel methodologies in bioconjugation, chemical
biology and organic synthesis, resulting in >35 papers and 5 submitted
patent applications. He is also a co-founder of the spin-out company ThioLogics
(www.thiologics.com), which offers
site-specific conjugation methods for the assembly of next generation
Biologics.
Sujiet Puthenveetil, Ph.D., Principal
Scientist, Medicinal Chemistry, Pfizer, Inc.
Sujiet
Puthenveetil Ph.D. is a Principal Scientist in the oncology division at Pfizer.
For over five years he has been involved in developing conjugation, analytical
and purification strategies to enable generation of novel payload carrying
antibody drug conjugates (ADC) at Pfizer. He also leads the chemical biology
efforts in the medicinal chemistry department to understand the metabolic
stability, bio-distribution and trafficking of novel therapeutic ADCs. Sujiet obtained his Ph.D. from the University
of Utah under the supervision of Prof. Peter Beal. Prior to joining Pfizer,
Sujiet was a postdoctoral researcher at Prof. Alice Ting’s lab at Massachusetts
Institute of Technology working in the field of protein engineering and
chemical biology.
Philipp Müller, Ph.D., Lab Head Biomedicine
University & University Hospital of Basel
Dr.
Philipp Müller is Head of the Cancer Immunology & Immunotherapy Laboratory
at the Department of Biomedicine; University & University Hospital of
Basel. He is working on and interested in the design and function of ADCs,
bispecific antibody formats as well as agonistic antibodies, such as anti-CD40,
and their therapeutic combination with immune-checkpoint blockade.
Kris Thielemans, Ph.D., Prof,
Immunology & Oncology, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Kris Thielemans Kris was
trained as an MD at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), spent some years in
the Laboratory of Dr. R. Levy at the Department of Oncology at the Stanford
University Medical School (Ca, USA) and obtained a PhD degree. Harnessing the
immune system to combat cancer is the main focus of his work. He manages the
Laboratory of Molecular and Cellular Therapy (LMCT) at the VUB for more than 30
years with a main focus on immune-therapeutic translational research including
clinical trials for the treatment of cancer and HIV. He is founder of the
spin-off company eTheRNA to implement mRNA based immunotherapy.
Amir R. Aref, Ph.D., Scientist, Medical
Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School
Amir Aref completed his Ph.D.
as a bio-engineer in UK and He has started his work in Roger Kamm’s group at
MIT to develop a 3D culture system for cancer research then he moved to
Dana-Farber cancer institute since 2011 at the medical oncology department to
optimise and test this system on clinical trials. He has already started to use
patient sample derived into this system for testing drugs and cytokines assays.
His talk title is: Microenvironment ex vivo for transnational studies using
patient-derived explants.
Kerry Chester, Ph.D., Professor, UCL
Cancer Institute
Kerry
Chester leads the Antibody Engineering Group at the
UCL Cancer Institute. She has over twenty years’ experience in antibody
engineering and antibody phage-display technology. Her main research interests
are design and construction of antibody-based therapeutics and the interaction
of these molecules with specific cancer targets. The work is largely
translational; her group designed and manufactured the first single chain Fv
antibody (scFv) to enter clinical trials and she is the academic lead of a GMP
facility, manufacturing recombinant antibody-based cancer treatments for
first-in-human trials. Current projects include bench-to-bedside development of
antibodies for use as: cancer imaging agents, antibody drug conjugates,
chimeric antigen receptors (CARS) and nano-medicines.
Dinner Course Biographies
Sergio A. Quezada, Ph.D., Professorial Research
Fellow, UCL Cancer Institute
Dr. Sergio Quezada is a Professorial Research
Fellow and Group Leader at UCL Cancer Institute in London where he heads the
Immune Regulation and Tumour Immunotherapy Laboratory. Prior to this, Dr.
Quezada worked with Dr. James Allison at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
studying the mechanisms governing anti-tumour T-cell immunity, and how these
mechanisms can be manipulated for the generation of potent anti-tumour immune
responses. Dr. Quezada’s research interest at UCL remains
focused in the study of the mechanism of action of anti-CTLA-4, anti-PD-1 and
other immune-modulatory antibodies targeting co-inhibitory and co-stimulatory
pathways (including ICOS, 4-1BB, OX-40) and used as novel anticancer therapies.
His group has particular interest in the evolution of the immune response to
cancer, the impact of immune-modulatory antibodies in the fate and function of
tumour reactive T cells, and the role that the tumour microenvironment plays in
the response and resistance to such therapies.
Dr Quezada is a Cancer Research UK Career
Development fellow and the recipient of a Cancer Research Institute
investigator Award.
Andrea van
Elsas, CSO, BioNovion B.V.
Andrea van Elsas is a founder and CSO of BioNovion, a subsidiary
to Aduro Biotech. He obtained his PhD in Leiden in 1996 on the molecular and
analysis of the immune response to melanoma, and subsequently secured a
post-doc grant from the Dutch Cancer Society to work with Jim Allison at UC
Berkeley on the use and mode-of-action of anti-CTLA-4 to treat cancer in the
mouse. In 1999, he joined R&D at Organon in the Netherlands, and a few
years later moved back to the US in 2006 to help run a therapeutic antibody
unit in Cambridge, MA, taking immune checkpoint antibody programs from
discovery to early development. After Organon’s acquisition by Schering-Plough
and supporting the integration of the oncology pipeline from both companies, he
led the Immune Oncology Proof-of-Concept team. Following his return to the
Netherlands and the acquisition by Merck, together with two former colleagues
he started BioNovion in 2011, a company focused on therapeutic antibody
discovery for Cancer Immunotherapy.
Nicolas Fischer, Ph.D.,
Head, Research, Novimmune SA
Nicolas Fischer obtained a PhD in Biology from the
Department of Molecular Biology University of Geneva on the structure and
function of photosynthetic complexes. As a postdoctoral fellow he joined the
Group of Sir Greg Winter at the MRC Department of Molecular Biology in
Cambridge UK to study protein folding and Antibody engineering using phage
display. In 2001 he joined NovImmune and led several therapeutic antibody
discovery programs that have reached clinical development stage. He is now
heading the Research Department and developing next generation bispecific antibody
formats.
Stefan Dübel, Ph.D.,
Managing Director and Professor, Biotechnology, Technische Universität
Braunschweig
Stefan Dübel co-pioneered in vitro antibody selection technologies,
resulting in several key inventions including antibody phage display (USPat.
5849500) or human antibody libraries with randomised CDRs (USPat. 5840479). His
lab continued to work on multiple topics related to human antibody engineering
and phage display, e.g. Hyperphage technology, RNase fusions, scFab, and
intrabodies. He is editor of the four volume "Handbook of Therapeutic
Antibodies“ (10/2014) and co-founder of the human antibody company Yumab. He is
Full Professor of Biotechnology and Director of the respective department at the Technische
Universität Braunschweig, Germany.