EFMC-YSN | ACSMEDI-YMCC Programme for Early Career Researchers
08:00
Chair
Dr Sean MCKENNA
LEIDEN UNIVERSITY, Leiden, The Netherlands
08:00
Panel Discussion
From Graduate Student to Young Professional: Career Perspectives from Industry, Academia and Beyond
Dr Hayley BINCH
F. HOFFMANN-LA ROCHE, Basel, Switzerland
Dr Hayley Binch is Head of Medicinal Chemistry at Hoffmann-La Roche in Basel. She obtained her PhD at University of Bristol, UK in the field of Organic Chemistry, followed by postdoctoral research at University of Hamburg, Germany and King’s College London. In 1998, she joined the Medicinal Chemistry department of Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Oxford, focusing on kinase research in the field of Oncology. In 2006, she moved to Vertex San Diego working on ion channels in pain and cystic fibrosis. In 2016, she joined as a Section Head within Medicinal Chemistry at Hoffmann-La Roche in Basel, and subsequently became Head of Medicinal Chemistry in 2017. At Roche, the Medicinal Chemistry department supports the design and synthesis of small molecules for Immunology, Infectious Diseases, Neuroscience, Oncology, Ophthalmology and Rare Diseases.
Prof. Luc BRUNSVELD
EINDHOVEN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Luc Brunsveld (1975) is chemical biologists specialized in protein-protein interactions and drug discovery. He obtained a PhD in 2001 with Prof. Bert Meijer from Eindhoven University of Technology. Subsequently, he was postdoctoral fellow with Prof. Herbert Waldmann at the Max-Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology (MPI, Dortmund, Germany) working on Rab and Ras protein semi-synthesis. After that, he was group leader in medicinal chemistry at Organon (Oss, the Netherlands, now Merck). In 2005, he started a research group at the MPI in Dortmund, working on supramolecular chemical biology, and subsequently also became group leader at the Chemical Genomics Centre of the Max Planck Society, working on protein-protein interactions. In 2008, he moved to TU/e where he was appointed Full Professor of Chemical Biology in the Department of Biomedical Engineering. His current research involves developing novel drug discovery concepts for “undruggable” proteins and drug discovery within biomolecular condensates.
Brunsveld has received numerous appealing grants, among which ERC Starting, Proof of Concept, and Advanced grants (2008, 2010, and 2023 respectively) and the NWO Vici grant (2015). He was awarded the NVBMB Award of the Dutch Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in 2010. the Gold Medal of the Royal Netherlands Chemical Society KNCV in 2013, and the Leadership in Excellence Award from the TU Eindhoven (2023). In 2022 Luc was elected as member of the KNAW (Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences). Together with Christian Ottmann (TU/e) and Michelle Arkin (UCSF), he is co-founder of Ambagon Therapeutics.
Dr Silvia ILLA TUSET
CRESSET, Royston, United Kingdom
Dr Mark MURCKO
DEWPOINT THERAPEUTICS, Boston, MA, United States
Mark Murcko has directly contributed to nine marketed drugs spanning glaucoma, HIV, HCV, and CF.
Mark received his PhD in organic chemistry at Yale. He began his career at Merck, where he helped discover multiple clinical candidates, including dorzolamide, a carbonic anhydrase inhibitor for the treatment of glaucoma. Dorzolamide became the first marketed drug in pharmaceutical history to result from a structure-based drug design program.
Mark was a founding scientist at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, joining in 1990, where he eventually became the chief technology officer and chair of the SAB. During his tenure he contributed to more than a dozen clinical candidates and all seven of Vertex's marketed drugs.
Since leaving Vertex in late 2011, Mark has helped ideate, launch, build, or disrupt more than 15 organizations working on diverse drug modalities and technologies. Notably, he is a founder, board member, and from 2016-2018 was the founding CSO at Relay Therapeutics. He is a Board member, strategic advisor, and from 2018-2021 was the founding CSO and Chief Innovation Officer at Dewpoint Therapeutics.
He is a co-author on more than 90 publications and a co-inventor on more than 50 issued patents.
Mark is a senior lecturer in the Department of Biological Engineering at MIT. He serves on the Board of Trustees of the Gordon Research Conferences and the Board of Advisors of the Boston Museum of Science.
Dr Floris VAN DELFT
SYNAFFIX, Oss, The Netherlands
Floris van Delft graduated in organic chemistry from Leiden University (1996, with honors). After a post-doctoral stay at the Scripps Research Institute (San Diego, USA), he held professorship positions at the University of Amsterdam (1998-1999), Radboud University Nijmegen (2000-2013) and Wageningen University (2015–2020), with his research focused primarily on click chemistry, carbohydrate chemistry and protein conjugation technologies. In 2010, Floris co-founded Synaffix, and he became the full-time chief scientific officer (CSO) for in 2014. He has been the driving force behind the scientific innovations that form the basis of Synaffix’ best-in-class antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) for targeted cancer therapy. Floris has (co)authored >150 peer-reviewed publications and is the (co)inventor of >35 patents.
Advances in Linkerology
Session Chair
Dr Carolyn DZIERBA
BRISTOL-MYERS SQUIBB, Cambridge, MA, United States
09:00
Targeted Cancer Therapy with Best-in-Class Antibody-Drug Conjugates Based on Clinical-Stage GlycoConnect™ and HydraSpace Technologies (IL07)
Dr Floris VAN DELFT
SYNAFFIX, Oss, The Netherlands
Floris van Delft graduated in organic chemistry from Leiden University (1996, with honors). After a post-doctoral stay at the Scripps Research Institute (San Diego, USA), he held professorship positions at the University of Amsterdam (1998-1999), Radboud University Nijmegen (2000-2013) and Wageningen University (2015–2020), with his research focused primarily on click chemistry, carbohydrate chemistry and protein conjugation technologies. In 2010, Floris co-founded Synaffix, and he became the full-time chief scientific officer (CSO) for in 2014. He has been the driving force behind the scientific innovations that form the basis of Synaffix’ best-in-class antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) for targeted cancer therapy. Floris has (co)authored >150 peer-reviewed publications and is the (co)inventor of >35 patents.
09:30
Catalent’s SMARTag® Technology: Novel Linker Solutions Enable Improved Tolerability of Solid Tumor-Targeting ADCs (IL08)
Dr Stepan CHUPRAKOV
CATALENT PHARMA SOLUTIONS INC, Emeryville, United States
Stepan Chuprakov is a synthetic organic chemist by training with over ten years of experience in the antibody-drug conjugates space. At Catalent Biologics – Emeryville, CA (formerly Redwood Bioscience) Stepan drives innovation, design, and synthesis of novel drug-linkers to facilitate the development of best-in-class therapeutic ADCs. He is an inventor on multiple patents related to Catalent’s SMARTag® technology encompassing state-of-the-art linkers, bioconjugation chemistries, and payloads for ADCs. Prior to joining Catalent, Stepan held scientist positions at Ambrx, Inc. and Scripps Research. He received his PhD degree in Chemistry from University of Illinois at Chicago.
10:00
Inducing Receptor Degradation as a Novel Approach to Target CC Chemokine Receptor 2 (CCR2)(OC07)
Dr Natalia V. ORTIZ ZACARIAS
LACDR, LEIDEN UNIVERSITY, Leiden, The Netherlands
Natalia Ortiz Zacarías completed her PhD in the field of Medicinal Chemistry at the Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research (LACDR), Leiden University. Her PhD thesis was awarded the 2019-2020 best thesis prize from the KNCV-Medicinal Chemistry & Chemical Biology (MCCB). After her PhD, she continued working as a Postdoctoral Researcher at both the LACDR and Oncode Institute, focusing on novel pharmacological concepts to better target chemokine receptors in cancer. In 2021, she worked as Research Scientist in the startup ARTICA Therapeutics, focusing on the characterization of novel small-molecule drugs. In 2021 she also obtained a Veni grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for her project “Towards illuminating and modulating chemokine receptor fate”, which she is currently performing at the group of Prof. Heitman, at the LACDR and Oncode Institute.
10:15
Targeted Protein Degradation of GPCRS: A Case Study of Novel CCR2 PROTACs (OC08)
Mr Khaled ESSA
LEIDEN UNIVERSITY, Leiden, The Netherlands
Khaled holds a Bachelor's degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences from Utrecht University (2015-2018) and pursued an international master's program in Innovative Medicine through the Erasmus Mundus Scholarship at the University of Groningen, Netherlands, and Uppsala University, Sweden (2018-2020). Currently a third-year PhD candidate at Leiden University, Netherlands, under the supervision of Prof. Laura Heitman (since 2021).
Khaled carried out internships in the Drug Design Group at the University of Groningen, where he focused on utilizing multicomponent chemistry for degrader development. Additionally, he explored novel photoredox catalytic methods for the synthesis of bioactive molecules at Bayer AG, Wuppertal, Germany.
His research focus lies in the discovery and development of novel modalities targeting class A G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs).
10:30
Coffee break & Exhibition
Impact of Novel Modalities on Clinical Pipelines
Session Chair
Dr Antonia F. STEPAN
F. HOFFMANN-LA ROCHE LTD, Basel, Switzerland
11:00
Development of Orally Bioavailable Peptides Targeting an Intra-cellular Protein: From a Hit to a Clinical KRAS Inhibitor (IL09)
Dr Ryuji HAYASHI
CHUGAI PHARMACEUTICAL CO.,LTD., Kanagawa , Japan
Ryuji earned his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from North Dakota State University. After postdoctoral training at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he joined Chugai Pharmaceutical. He is currently a group head of discovery chemistry department at Chugai Pharmaceutical and managing number of drug discovery projects associated with macrocyclic peptides.
11:30
Targeted Protein Degradation Using Cereblon Molecular Glues (IL10)
Dr Lyn H. JONES
DANA FARBER CANCER INSTITUTE, Boston, MA, United States
Lyn Jones completed PhD studies in synthetic organic chemistry at the University of Nottingham, before starting his postdoctoral research at The Scripps Research Institute (La Jolla, California) in chemical biology. He joined Pfizer (Sandwich, UK) as a medicinal chemistry team leader, eventually becoming Head of Chemical Biology and Lead Discovery Technologies. He transferred to Pfizer Cambridge, MA to become Head of Rare Disease Chemistry and Head of Chemical Biology. He then helped build Jnana Therapeutics as Head of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, before moving to the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston as Director of the Center for Protein Degradation.
His research interests include the creation and application of chemistry-based technologies to advance therapeutic target discovery and to accelerate drug development. He is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Royal Society of Biology, and the Linnean Society, and serves on the editorial board of the journal RSC Medicinal Chemistry and the board of the Medicinal and Bioorganic Chemistry Foundation.
12:00
Peptides from Bench to Clinical Studies: Our Experience with CXCR4 (OC09)
Dr Salvatore DI MARO
UNIVERSITÀ DEGLI STUDI DELLA CAMPANIA, CASERTA, Italy
Salvatore Di Maro is associate professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”. He earned his degree in Medicinal Chemistry in 2005 and subsequently pursued his Ph.D. under the guidance of Professor Paolo Grieco at the University of Naples “Federico II”. From 2006 to 2008, he joined the group of prof. Jung-Mo Ahn at the University of Texas at Dallas as a visiting scientist. Since 2015, his laboratory is active in the development and application of advanced peptide synthesis techniques to identify new antitumor candidate drugs. Prof. Di Maro’s research covers a broad spectrum of mechanisms, ranging from designing ligands that target cell membrane receptors (such as CXCR4 and integrin) to developing inhibitors of protein-protein interactions (TRF2/Apollo, MDM2/p53, BAX). In 2022 he co-founded CIRCE, a start-up company dedicated to pioneering novel platforms for the development of epigenetic prodrugs aimed at anticancer intervention. In 2019 he was awarded best young researcher in medicinal chemistry (Medicinal Chemistry Division prize) by the Italian Chemical Society and best young researcher in peptide chemistry (“Vittorio Espramer prize”) by the Italian Peptide Society. Prof. Di Maro is author of 58 papers and inventor of two patents.
12:15
Nizubaglustat, a Novel L-ido Azasugar in Development for GM1, GM2 Gangliosidoses and Niemann-Pick Type C Diseases (OC10)
Dr Kyle LANDSKRONER
AZAFAROS, Basel, Switzerland
12:30
13:00
Company Workshop by Schrodinger
A Focus on Early Career Investigators
Session Chair
Dr Rita PETRACCA
UTRECHT UNIVERSITY, Utrecht, The Netherlands
14:00
Targeting Challenging Proteins Using an Integrative Antibody Discovery Approach (IL11)
Dr Francesco APRILE
IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON, London, United Kingdom
Dr Aprile is an Assistant Professor and UKRI Future Leaders Fellow in the Department of Chemistry of Imperial College London. His research, which combines chemical biology and biophysics, focuses on the development of antibodies as research and clinical tools. In particular, Dr Aprile’s team applies integrative discovery methods to develop antibodies to investigate neurotoxic protein aggregates, called amyloids, which are a hallmark of many forms of dementia. Previously, he was a Senior Research Fellow of the Alzheimer's Society UK at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Cambridge, where he investigated protein self-assembly in the context of neurodegenerative diseases. Dr Aprile obtained his PhD at the Department of Biotechnology and Biosciences at the University of Milano-Bicocca.
14:15
Dynamics and Mechanism of CRISPR-Cas9 through the Lens of Computational Methods (IL12)
Dr Giulia PALERMO
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE, Riverside, United States
Giulia Palermo is a computational biophysicist, Associate Professor at the University of California Riverside in the Department of Bioengineering and Chemistry.
She is a native of Italy where she earned her PhD in 2013 from the Italian Institute of Technology working with Dr. Marco De Vivo. Her graduate studies led to more than 10 first-author papers, drawing on quantum chemistry and mixed quantum-classical methods to explore the mechanistic function of a number of enzymes. During her two-year post-doc at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in the group of Prof. Ursula Rothlisberger, she initiated studies of allostery in proteins and nucleic acids, focusing on chromatin drug development and on the mechanism of RNA splicing by the spliceosome.
In 2016, she was awarded a Swiss National Science Foundation (NSF) post-doctoral fellowship to join the group of Prof. J. Andrew McCammon at the University of California San Diego. At UCSD, she worked on novel multiscale approaches and enhanced simulations to enable studying increasingly realistic biological systems obtained through cryo-EM and tomography. Her interests focus on understanding dynamics and mechanisms of novel CRISPR-Cas gene-editing systems that are transformative for life sciences.
14:30
Discovery of Hedgehog Acyltransferase (HHAT) Inhibitors as a Novel Strategy to Stop Hedgehog Signalling in Cancer (OC11)
Dr Efthymios S. GAVRIIL
IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON, London, United Kingdom
Dr Efthymios Gavriil obtained his PhD in Medicinal Chemistry in 2018 from the University of Athens, working on novel substituted purine isosters as anti-cancer agents. During his 3-year postdoc at the Drug Discovery Unit of Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute, he contributed to the progression of two kinase inhibition projects at the hit-to-lead and lead optimisation stages. In 2022, he joined Prof. Ed Tate’s group at Imperial College London as a Research Associate in Medicinal Chemistry and Cancer Drug Discovery. He is currently working on several projects in the fields of oncology, immunology and neglected tropical diseases. Efthymios is also a leading member of The European Network for Postdocs in Cancer Research.
14:45
Selective Substrate Identification Using Chemically Modified Phage Display (OC12)
Mr Franco FAUCHER
STANFORD UNIVERSITY, Stanford, United States
Franco Faucher 5th year PhD Student in Chemistry in Matthew Bogyo’s Lab at Stanford University Department of Pathology. The main focus of his PhD. has been the development of peptide therapeutics and diagnostics for cancer therapy and imaging. He is looking to join the biopharmaceutical industry and become an expert in peptide-based therapeutics.
15:00
Potent Bispecific T Cell Engagers Obtained by Tyrosine Click Chemistry (OC13)
Ms Irene SHAJAN
WAGENINGEN UNIVERSITY & RESEARCH, Wageningen, The Netherlands
Irene is a fourth year PhD candidate at Laboratory of Organic Chemistry, Wageningen University & Research working under the supervision of Dr. Bauke Albada and Prof. Floris van Delft. Her research focusses on the development of antibody conjugates using (biogenic) tyrosine-based click chemistry from off-the-shelf antibodies. After her master’s degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from Sacred Heart College, India (2017-2019), Irene worked as a Project Assistant at Indian Institute of Technology Palakkad under the supervision of Dr. Sushabhan Sadhukhan developing cardioprotective mitochondria-targeting EGCG derivatives.
15:15
Borylated Cyclobutanes Via Thermal [2+2]-Cycloaddition (OC14)
Dr Olha KOLODIAZHNA
ENAMINE, Kyiv, Ukraine
Olga Kolodiazhna was born in Kyiv, Ukraine. In 2014 she received PhD in biochemistry in the V.P. Kukhar Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry and Petrochemistry (IBOPC) of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. She began working as a research chemist at Enamine corporation in 2014, where she contributed to the identification of innovative building blocks utilized in drug design. Synthesis of potentially biologically active compounds derived from natural sources, development of novel reagents and methods for asymmetric synthesis of organophosphorus compounds, and biocatalysts and chemo-catalysts are among Olga's research interests. She has authored over thirty scientific articles in collaboration. Since 2023, Olga has held the position of Chief Strategy Officer at Enamine(Kyiv, Ukraine).
15:30
Coffee break & Exhibition
Plenary lecture 3
16:00
Cancer Drug Discovery Using Fragment-Based Methods (PL03)
Prof. Stephen W. FESIK
VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY, Nashville, United States
Dr Stephen Fesik obtained his PhD in Medicinal Chemistry from the University of Connecticut and was a postdoc at Yale Medical School. After his postdoc, he joined Abbott Laboratories where he reached highest level of the scientific ladder and served as Divisional Vice President of Cancer Research. In 2009, he joined Vanderbilt as a professor of Biochemistry, Pharmacology, and Chemistry. In addition, he is the Orrin H. Ingram, II Chair in Cancer Research and a member of the Vanderbilt Institute of Chemical Biology, the Vanderbilt Ingram Cancer Center, and the Center for Structural Biology.
Poster Session
16:45
Poster session 2 (even numbers)
18:00
End of the scientific programme
20:00