14
May

08:00 AM ET

Drug Discovery Biology

Name: Drug Discovery Biology & Bioinformatics Strategy Meeting East Coast 2024
Start: 2024-05-14T08:00
End: 2024-05-14T18:00
Location: Hyatt Regency Princeton

&

Bioinformatics

Strategy Meeting East Coast USA 2024

Pushing our understanding of the physiological context and quality of drug target characterisation, validation, and safety profiling throughout the preclinical space

Hyatt Regency Princeton

A MEETING EXPERIENCE UNLIKE ANY OTHER

Fresh R&D Insights

Tired of the same conference experience? Real discussions and genuine networking are often promised, but not always delivered. Proventa International’s R&D Strategy Meetings are designed to avoid the pitfalls of a typical conference, by providing the right environment to make those important connections through interactive roundtable discussions, exclusive networking and keynote panel debates. Join Biology and Bioinformatics professionals from across the East Coast, in Princeton, New Jersey, to discover new insights and take your company’s mission to the next level.

What makes our strategy meetings unique?

Roundtable Discussions

Intimate discussions led by renowned industry experts. Have your voice heard and debate alongside like-minded life science executives.

Unrivalled Networking

With senior delegation from big pharma and innovative biotech from across the East Coast, you can network with peers from different locations, all in one place.

Personalised Agenda

Choose the topics that matter to you. Reserve your place at the roundtable discussions and ensure your whole day delivers the insights you need to hear.

Solutions to your Problems

We’ve partnered with the best solution providers to solve your biggest challenges. Engage in pre-arranged, private meetings to address your specific needs and find a tangible solution.

Industry Researched Topics

We guarantee our agenda is up-to-date and mission critical because its designed by you. We speak to our extended network of senior decision makers to ensure the most important topics are discussed.

Senior Decision Makers

The entire strategy meeting is specifically tailored to the needs and challenges of senior life science professionals. Discover how your peers are dealing with the same challenges as you.

Meet Our Facilitators

Our panel of facilitators play a key role in shaping the agenda for the day. See who will be bringing their expertise to the table at our upcoming strategy meeting.

Aaron Mackey

Former SVP, AI & Data Science Sonata Therapeutics

Abhijat Vatsyayan

Head of AI and Innovation Taiho Oncology

Andrew Zhang

Director, Head of Chemical Biology AstraZeneca

Angela Huang

Founder and President Tempo Bioscience

Christopher Conway

President, Research and Development Curia

Chris is a seasoned business executive with a 25 year strong track record across a variety of industry verticals including aerospace, pharmaceutical/biotech and contract research, development, and manufacturing. Chris is highly experienced in P&L leadership, sales, and marketing having worked in large and small, public and private equity backed companies. Currently, Chris serves as President and R&D Business Unit Head at Curia, a global top ten organization in contract research, development and manufacturing services, serving the pharmaceutical/biotech industry. Chris also currently serves as a Director on the board of two Life Sciences organizations including Viyash Life Sciences Private Limited, a Carlyle owned company, as well as the Drug, Chemical & Associated Technologies Association, Inc. (DCAT). Chris received his B.S. in Marketing & Management from Siena College and his Doctorate of Humane Letters from the Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences

Claudette Fuller

Vice President, Head of Non-Clinical Safety & Toxicology Genmab

Douglas Kitchen

Research Fellow, Medicinal Chemistry Curia

Ernane Souza, PhD, RPh

Assistant Director, Translational PKPD and DMPK Supernus Pharmaceuticals Inc

Frank Leu

Founder & Managing Member/ Managing Member BioPharMatrix LLC/ Novapeutics LLC

Greg Williams

Senior Research Scientist II, Cellular Assay Technologies Curia

Dr. Gregory Williams, Senior Research Scientist II, joined Curia in 2020. He serves as the Cell- Based Assay Technologies (CBAT) team leader at Curia’s Integrated Drug Discovery facility in Buffalo, NY. Dr. Williams and his team work to develop cell-based models of human disease using a combination of approaches to support both large-molecule and small-molecule discovery. He has over 10 years’ experience in cell-based assay development and screening of small molecules and has managed more than 150 client based projects in the fields of immunology, oncology, and neurobiology. Leveraging state-of-the-art high content screening tools, automation, and multiplex analysis approaches, Dr. Williams and his team work towards delivering innovative, predictive, and cost-effective assays that drive pre-clinical drug discovery programs. Dr. Williams received his PhD in Biochemistry at the University at Buffalo, where he published work in journals such as Cell and Nature. As a Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow, he investigated the role of small-molecule histone deacetylase inhibitors in the progression of Huntington’s disease at the National University of Ireland in Galway.

Dr. Grant Carr

Vice President, Head of Global R&D Drug Discovery Curia

Gunaretnam Rajagopal

Venture Partner Samsara Biocapital

Guna has experience in applying Informatics & Analytics across the entire drug discovery & development pipeline to advance the search and development of safe and effective medicines. His training and expertise encompass the fields of Data Sciences, AI/Machine Learning, Bioinformatics, Computational, Systems Biology & Pharmacology, Genetics & Genomics, High Performance Computing and Theoretical & Computational Physics. He received his PhD in Computational & Theoretical Physics from Georgia Tech in 1991. Guna was an Assistant Director of Research at the Cavendish (1996-2000) and elected a Fellow of Jesus College Cambridge (1996-2000). He moved to Singapore to be the founding Executive Director of the Bioinformatics Institute (2000-2007) that coordinated and supported biomedical computing & informatics supporting public & pharmaceutical R&D institutes at the BIOPOLIS. In 2008, he moved to Rutgers University to head the Bioinformatics & Systems Biology program at the Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey (a NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center), with a joint appointment as Adjunct Professor at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and as a Member of the School of Natural Sciences, Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton (2007-2012). In 2012, he was recruited to Johnson & Johnson to lead efforts to develop and deploy Computational, Informatics and Data Science infrastructure & capabilities to support global programs in basic, clinical, translational research across all therapeutic and functional areas. After ten years at J&J,

Marcie Glicksman

Vice President, Biology Enclear Therapies

Mark Tornetta

VP/Director of Biologics Discovery Tavotek Biotherapeutics

ML Ujwal

Associate Director, Data Science Johnson & Johnson

Nikolaos Tezapsidis

President & CEO Neurotez Inc.

Paul Kayne

Vice President, Biological Sciences Palatin Technologies

First name	Last name	Job title	Company name	Photo URL	Bio Position
Aaron	Mackey	Former SVP, AI & Data Science	Sonata Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Aaron-Mackey.jpg	Throughout his career, Aaron has specialized in developing advanced statistical models to decipher complex biological signals from vast genomics, clinical RWE, and clinical trial datasets. He focuses on integrating multiple datasets to enhance insights and uncover hidden relationships, and to translate these findings into actionable insights that inform decisions and drive strategies.
Abhijat	Vatsyayan	Head of AI and Innovation	Taiho Oncology	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Abhijat-Vatsyayan.jpg	Trained as an aerospace engineer Abhijat has had a career spanning over 23 years most of it dedicated to helping to bring life extending medicines to patients through the use of technology in this 20 years working at pharmaceutical companies he collaborates with individuals from diverse backgrounds applying analytical design and creative problem solving skills to the complex challenge of drug development abhijat also has a foundational understanding of artificial intelligence including machine learning and has built simplified deep learning frameworks to educate and present machine learning concepts finally he is also a proud co founder of multiple failed startups.
Andrew	Zhang	Director, Head of Chemical Biology	AstraZeneca	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Andrew-Zhang.jpg	Andrew Zhang is the Director and Head of Chemical Biology at AstraZeneca. He joined AstraZeneca in 2013 and his team’s remit is using chemical probes and mass spectrometry-based discovery proteomics for deconvoluting the mechanism of drug target engagement towards identifying drivers of efficacy and adverse safety events. Andrew’s scientific career started at the University of California, Berkeley, where he obtained a B.S. in Chemistry and a B.A. in Molecular and Cell Biology, and he received his Ph.D. with Professor David Spiegel at Yale working on small molecule immunomodulators. Andrew trained as a postdoctoral fellow at the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (Toronto, Canada) with Dr. Rima Al-awar.
Angela	Huang	Founder and President	Tempo Bioscience	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/angelahuang.png	Tempo Bioscience focuses on developing human stem cell (human iPSC technology) based 2D&3D cell models and biosensor-incorporated platform technologies for the biotech-pharmaceutical industry. Angela is listed as an inventor on numerous patents and has published in journals such as Nature. She received her scientific training from University of California, Berkeley, University of California, San Diego, and University of California, San Francisco.
Christopher	Conway	President, Research and Development	Curia	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Chris-Conway.jpg	Chris is a seasoned business executive with a 25 year strong track record across a variety of industry verticals including aerospace, pharmaceutical/biotech and contract research, development, and manufacturing. Chris is highly experienced in P&L leadership, sales, and marketing having worked in large and small, public and private equity backed companies. Currently, Chris serves as President and R&D Business Unit Head at Curia, a global top ten organization in contract research, development and manufacturing services, serving the pharmaceutical/biotech industry. Chris also currently serves as a Director on the board of two Life Sciences organizations including Viyash Life Sciences Private Limited, a Carlyle owned company, as well as the Drug, Chemical & Associated Technologies Association, Inc. (DCAT). Chris received his B.S. in Marketing & Management from Siena College and his Doctorate of Humane Letters from the Albany College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences
Claudette	Fuller	Vice President, Head of Non-Clinical Safety & Toxicology	Genmab	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Claudette-Fuller.jpg	At Genmab, Dr. Fuller oversees a global team charged with leading the strategic and regulated nonclinical development of cutting-edge antibody technology targeting oncology (Epkinly & Tivdak) and inflammatory disease indications. Dr. Fuller has held positions at Merck Research Labs and GlaxoSmithKline R&D, where she directed the nonclinical development of programs within the Infectious Diseases Therapy Area, the Immunology Therapy Area, and a large number of immuno-oncology drugs (including Keytruda) at Merck. Additionally, Dr. Fuller has had the great fortune of working as the primary nonclinical safety lead on numerous immunology, immuno-oncology, and vaccine development programs.
Douglas	Kitchen	Research Fellow, Medicinal Chemistry	Curia	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Douglas-Kitchen.jpg	Doug Kitchen obtained his Ph.D. from Princeton University (Chemistry). He joined AMRI in 1997 to begin the computational chemistry group. Kitchen’s interests are in compound library design, structure-guided drug design and lead optimization. He is a co-inventor on more than 10 issued patents and author on more than forty refereed articles and book chapters. Two of Dr.Kitchen’s inventions are now marketed drugs. He joined AMRI in 1997 to begin the computational chemistry group. Doug’s interests are in compound library design, structure-guided drug design and lead optimization. He is a co-inventor on more than 10 issued patentsand author on more than forty refereed articles and book chapters
Ernane	Souza, PhD,	Assistant Director, Translational PKPD and DMPK	Supernus Pharmaceuticals Inc	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Ernane-Souza.jpg	Dr. Ernane Souza works as an Assistant Director at Supernus Pharmaceuticals. His responsibilities comprise multiple stages of preclinical drug development, from computer aided drug-design to DMPK, PBPK modeling, all the way to first-in-human clinical trials. He is a licensed pharmacist and medicinal chemist. Prior to transitioning to the pharmaceutical industry, he managed his independent research lab in academia, where he led the development of a new class of anticoagulants while teaching ADME and MedChem to professional student pharmacists. He is familiar with intellectual property law and is the primary inventor in pending patents related to novel drug candidates.
Frank	Leu	Founder & Managing Member/ Managing Member	BioPharMatrix LLC/ Novapeutics LLC	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Frank-Leu-1.jpg	Frank Leu is a Founder & Managing Member/ Managing Member of BioPharMatrix LLC/ Novapeutics LLC located in Philadelphia, developing a first-in-class insulin-producing beta-cell restoration curative for diabetes. Prior, Frank was at a specialty pharma, Verto Institute, developing curatives for a neuroendocrine cancer. Frank received his Pharmacology Ph.D. from Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences, postdoc-ed at a HHMI lab at the Rockefeller University, and served as an instructor at the Rutgers Cancer Institute of NJ. Currently, he is an adjunct professor at Thomas Jefferson University, advisor to 1776 for Pennovation Center Labs, founder of BioPharMatrix (life-science ecosystem), and serving on numerous life-sciences advisory boards.
Greg	Williams	Senior Research Scientist II, Cellular Assay Technologies	Curia	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Greg-Williams.jpg	Dr. Gregory Williams, Senior Research Scientist II, joined Curia in 2020. He serves as the Cell- Based Assay Technologies (CBAT) team leader at Curia’s Integrated Drug Discovery facility in Buffalo, NY. Dr. Williams and his team work to develop cell-based models of human disease using a combination of approaches to support both large-molecule and small-molecule discovery. He has over 10 years’ experience in cell-based assay development and screening of small molecules and has managed more than 150 client based projects in the fields of immunology, oncology, and neurobiology. Leveraging state-of-the-art high content screening tools, automation, and multiplex analysis approaches, Dr. Williams and his team work towards delivering innovative, predictive, and cost-effective assays that drive pre-clinical drug discovery programs. Dr. Williams received his PhD in Biochemistry at the University at Buffalo, where he published work in journals such as Cell and Nature. As a Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow, he investigated the role of small-molecule histone deacetylase inhibitors in the progression of Huntington’s disease at the National University of Ireland in Galway.
Dr.	Grant Carr	Vice President, Head of Global R&D Drug Discovery	Curia	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/grant-carr.jpg	Dr. Grant Carr is a 30-year biopharmaceutical discovery and development veteran with degrees from Imperial College and Oxford. He is currently the Vice President of Global R&D Discovery Services for Curia, a global contract research, development and manufacturing organization headquartered in Albany, NY. Prior to assuming his current role, Dr. Carr was the Head of Discovery Biology at Curia and Director of Screening Operations at Elitra Pharmaceuticals, a start-up focused on the identification of novel antibiotics and their mechanisms of action, ultimately acquired by Merck. Based in Buffalo, NY, Dr. Carr is a diehard Bills fan.
Gunaretnam	Rajagopal	Venture Partner	Samsara Biocapital	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Gunaretnam-Rajagopal.jpg	Guna has experience in applying Informatics & Analytics across the entire drug discovery & development pipeline to advance the search and development of safe and effective medicines. His training and expertise encompass the fields of Data Sciences, AI/Machine Learning, Bioinformatics, Computational, Systems Biology & Pharmacology, Genetics & Genomics, High Performance Computing and Theoretical & Computational Physics. He received his PhD in Computational & Theoretical Physics from Georgia Tech in 1991. Guna was an Assistant Director of Research at the Cavendish (1996-2000) and elected a Fellow of Jesus College Cambridge (1996-2000). He moved to Singapore to be the founding Executive Director of the Bioinformatics Institute (2000-2007) that coordinated and supported biomedical computing & informatics supporting public & pharmaceutical R&D institutes at the BIOPOLIS. In 2008, he moved to Rutgers University to head the Bioinformatics & Systems Biology program at the Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey (a NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center), with a joint appointment as Adjunct Professor at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and as a Member of the School of Natural Sciences, Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton (2007-2012). In 2012, he was recruited to Johnson & Johnson to lead efforts to develop and deploy Computational, Informatics and Data Science infrastructure & capabilities to support global programs in basic, clinical, translational research across all therapeutic and functional areas. After ten years at J&J,
Marcie	Glicksman	Vice President, Biology	Enclear Therapies	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Marcie-Glicksman.jpg	Marcie Glicksman, Ph.D. Vice President, Biology at EnClear Therapies. For the past 30 years, Dr. Glicksman has been dedicated to developing better therapeutics for the nervous system and other therapeutic areas. Her efforts include 8 drugs entering the clinic and 2 marketed drugs. She has worked in both the biopharmaceutical industry and academics. In her career, she has broad experience including preclinical animal studies and toxicology. Dr. Glicksman received a bachelor’s degree from Brown University and a Ph.D. degree in Neuroscience from Washington University. Dr. Glicksman has over 80 publications and more than 16 issued patents.
Mark	Tornetta	VP/Director of Biologics Discovery	Tavotek Biotherapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Mark-Tornetta.jpg	Mark Tornetta has 30+ years of lead discovery experience in the biopharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors. The first 10+ years he performed antibody engineering and small molecule screening for de-orphanizing GPCR targets at SmithKline Beecham. The next 18+ years at Centocor/J&J he was part of an antibody engineering team that implemented 2 phage display technologies that generated thousands of candidates to hundreds of targets. His most accomplished project was discovering an antibody currently in the clinic at GSK for pulmonary inflammatory indications. The last 3 years at Tavotek he implemented a unique antibody generation platform called TAVOSelect which has generated thousands of VHOs to many IO targets.
ML	Ujwal	Associate Director, Data Science	Johnson & Johnson	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/ML-Ujwal-Janssen.jpg	ML Ujwal PhD leads the PSTS/Data Science at Janssen R&D (J&J). He is a proven scientific leader with a strong pedigree in Drug Discovery and Applied Machine Learning. He has 15+ years of experience in academia, biotech, and large pharma. Before joining Janssen R&D, he co-founded and was the head of Data Sciences at Inciton, an early-stage startup that used MD simulations and ML approaches. Earlier he led predictive toxicology efforts at Eli Lilly & Co. He was on staff at the Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR). His academic credentials include MIT Engineering Management with an emphasis on systems thinking and ML frameworks. As an IIJMB Wood-Whelan fellow, he is a joint PhD in Computational Biochemistry/Biophysics from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and the University of Texas, Austin, followed by post-doctoral work both at Yale and Harvard. He has extensively published in peer-reviewed journals and serves on scientific advisory committees.
Nikolaos	Tezapsidis	President & CEO	Neurotez Inc.	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Nikolaos-Tezapsidis.jpg	Nikolaos Tezapsidis, PhD is the Founder, President, CEO, and Chairman of Neurotez, Inc., a pioneering biotechnology company established in 2005. With over 18 years of hands-on biomedical research experience, he has spearheaded the development of Memtin, a recombinant human Leptin product aimed at hormone replacement therapy for hypoleptinemic prodromal Alzheimer’s patients. Under his leadership, Neurotez raised $5 million through non-dilutive capital, secured private investments, and built a robust patent portfolio with over 20 issued and pending patents. A distinguished researcher, he has authored 50+ peer-reviewed publications and received accolades such as the InvestAcure Coin Award for advancements in Alzheimer’s treatment
Paul	Kayne	Vice President, Biological Sciences	Palatin Technologies	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Paul-Kayne.jpg	Dr. Paul Kayne has an extensive track record of innovation enabling pharmaceutical R&D and life-cycle management. He is currently VP of Biological Sciences at Palatin, a company focusing on resolving inflammatory diseases.Prior to joining Palatin, Dr. Kayne held several roles at Bristol-Myers Squibb, most recently Head of Discovery Genomics & Proteomics. Previously, Dr. Kayne built one of the earliest microarray teams while at SmithKline Beecham and was a member of the Research Faculty at the California Institute of Technology. Dr. Kayne received his Ph.D. in molecular biology from the UCLA and his B.A. in molecular biology/biochemistry from the UCSB.

Aaron Mackey, Abhijat Vatsyayan, Andrew Zhang, Angela Huang, Christopher Conway, Claudette Fuller, Douglas Kitchen, Ernane Souza, PhD, RPh, Frank Leu, Greg Williams, Dr. Grant Carr, Gunaretnam Rajagopal, Marcie Glicksman, Mark Tornetta, ML Ujwal, Nikolaos Tezapsidis, Paul Kayne

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Drug Discovery Biology & Bioinformatics Strategy Meeting East Coast 2024

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Strategy Meeting East Coast USA 2024

<img class="lazy" decoding="async" src="data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E" data-src="https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/location.png" >Hyatt Regency Princeton

Fresh R&D Insights

What makes our strategy meetings unique?

Roundtable Discussions

Unrivalled Networking

Personalised Agenda

Solutions to your Problems

Industry Researched Topics

Senior Decision Makers

Meet Our Facilitators

Aaron Mackey

Abhijat Vatsyayan

Andrew Zhang

Angela Huang

Christopher Conway

Claudette Fuller

Douglas Kitchen

Ernane Souza, PhD, RPh

Frank Leu

Greg Williams

Dr. Grant Carr

Gunaretnam Rajagopal

Marcie Glicksman

Mark Tornetta

ML Ujwal

Nikolaos Tezapsidis

Paul Kayne

Our Agenda

See Which Topics Are Discussed at the Strategy Meeting

Opening Keynote Presentation

Mechanistic understanding of E3 ligase engagement: Yesterday’s news or hidden secrets?

Roundtable ( Pharma/Biotech )

Roundtable Tracks

Refreshment Break

Networking/1-1 Meetings

Roundtable ( Solutions )

Roundtable Tracks

Curia

Curia

Curia

Roundtable ( Pharma/Biotech )

Roundtable Tracks

Networking Lunch

Networking/1-1 Meetings

Afternoon Keynote Presentation

Intellectual property development in an artificially intelligent world

Rountable Discussion ( Pharma/Biotech )

Roundtable Tracks

Refreshment Break

Panel Discussion

Tackling the pros and cons of different financing blueprint: go-to-clinic vs go-to-market vs go-to-fundraising strategies and the criteria to determine which program an organization can adapt

Drinks and Canapes Reception

Reasons To Attend Our Strategy Meetings

Fully Interactive Format

Senior Decision Makers

Personalised Agendas

Private and Intimate Networking

Our 2024 Sponsors

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Testimonials

Hotel & Venue

Hyatt Regency Princeton

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Hyatt Regency Princeton