Broadcast Date: November 7, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Automated analysis of medical imaging data is just one of the ways that artificial intelligence (AI) technologies are transforming the standard of care in medicine. Across industry and academia, scientists are using AI to extract useful patterns from data, improve studies of conditions such as neurological disorders, oncology, and ophthalmology, and increasingly in the context of drug development. There are ample opportunities to leverage AI in the drug development process from discovery and development to the design, conduct, and interpretation of clinical trials. One critical area is the analysis and management of complex clinical information such as medical imaging data, which contains important insights for assessing the effectiveness of treatments. 

In this GEN webinar, Dr. Shelby Wyatt will discuss how AI-based medical imaging helps imaging/data scientists, innovators, and healthcare professionals accelerate drug development initiatives and projects and move the needle towards personalized healthcare. She will discuss how Flywheel builds reliable, scalable medical imaging solutions that seamlessly integrate advanced AI technology from NVIDIA and other technology partners to enable robust imaging data management and analysis. 

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Broadcast Date: November 9, 2023
Time: 9:00 am PT, 12:00 pm ET, 18:00 CET

The human brain has ~170 billion cells, with roughly 170 trillion synaptic connections, organized into distinct regions, structures, and cortical layers. This complex intersection between cellular connectivity and neuroanatomy has made it challenging to untangle discrete functions in health and disease. Spatial profiling at the single cell level makes it possible to move beyond deductive science and delve into the gene expression changes occurring in tissue micro environments during disease development and therapeutic response more directly.  

In this GEN webinar, our distinguished speaker Dr. Simon Gregory will demonstrate how 10x Genomics’ Xenium Mouse Brain Gene Expression Panel and a Custom Add-on Panel can be used to characterize therapeutic response in brain cancer and white matter injury repair. He will demonstrate the use of single cell spatial imaging with these panels to examine pathological processes associated with the development of diffuse midline glioma, and tumor response to a novel therapeutic intervention. He will also share results assessing the impact of a new oxysterol therapy on an intestinal perforation model of cerebral palsy. 

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Broadcast Date: November 3, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Hydrogen/deuterium exchange coupled to mass spectrometry (HX-MS) is a valuable technique for analyzing the structural features and dynamic properties of individual proteins and large protein complexes. HX-MS can be used to study a wide range of structural properties including protein folding, ligand binding and allostery, and epitope mapping in the development of therapeutic antibodies. However, HX-MS is not routinely used in protein structure analysis because of data analysis challenges that limit its throughput and scope.  

In this GEN webinar, Dr. David Schriemer, University of Calgary, will present an innovative approach for applying HX-MS to protein analysis in biotherapeutics development. He will demonstrate a data independent acquisition-based HX-MS workflow that significantly reduces analysis times, enables the study of larger datasets, and paves the way for a standardized strategy for protein structure analysis. Dr. Schriemer will show how HX-MS can rapidly characterize drug-binding interactions using a 500-kDa mammalian kinase using affinity pulldowns.  

Key takeaways from the webinar include:

• Discovering the latest MS advances that benefit HX-MS technology.
• Learning about the implementation of data-independent acquisition for HX-MS.
• Learning how to use HX-MS to study drug binding interactions and higher-order protein structure dynamics.
• Understanding the data mining approach used to confirm peptide ID and authenticate, or even correct, MS1-based deuteration calculations.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentations, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Produced with support from:

David Schriemer, PhD
Professor
University of Calgary

Broadcast Date: October 31, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Gene therapies are maturing rapidly with an increasing number of these treatments gaining regulatory approval in recent years. Viral vectors, such as adeno-associated viruses (AAVs), have emerged as one of the most used gene delivery vehicles in many disease contexts. Their unique features make them suitable vectors for in vivo gene therapies for various conditions including ophthalmological, metabolic, hematological, and neurological diseases.

In this GEN webinar, our expert speakers will discuss strategies and tools for designing optimal viral vectors for gene therapy delivery. They will present an integrated platform designed to support the discovery stages of a viral gene therapy program. During the webinar, you’ll learn:

• How WuXi AppTec can help to engineer and optimize viral vectors, including rationalized promoter design and transcription unit optimization.

• Fast, scalable, cost-effective viral vector production methods using industry standard transient transfection, packaging cell lines, and the novel TESSA technology.

• How to utilize a range of in vitro and in vivo assays for efficacy and safety evaluation.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelists.

Panelists:

Broadcast Date: October 27, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

The relevance of mRNA as a therapeutic strategy has gained prominence in recent years. Its success is primarily because of mRNA’s stability and translation efficiency due to sequence optimization and regulation in modification, the ability to target specific cells with sufficient production of proteins of interest without cellular amplification, and its functionality in the cytoplasm negating the risk of host genome integration. However, mRNA’s effectiveness can be compromised by degradation and reduced cellular uptake due to its large size and anionic charge. Using ionizable lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) addresses these issues by facilitating endosomal escape, stabilizing the nucleic acid cargo, and protecting it from nuclease degradation. With the success of the COVID-19 mRNA-based vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, the demand for scaled-up production of mRNA-LNPs is rapidly growing.  

In this webinar, our expert will discuss the strategies for scaling up mRNA-LNP production in which the encapsulation approach (e.g. Nano Assemblr^® Ignite, Blaze, etc.), method of buffer exchange, and filtration all play a significant role. He will touch on salient parameters that need to be considered at each juncture of the production phase dependent on the scale to ensure a safe and efficacious mRNA-LNP.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Broadcast Date: October 23, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Bispecific antibodies (bsAbs) and multispecific antibodies (msAbs) are a growing class of biotherapeutics with enormous potential in oncology, neurodegenerative diseases and other areas. However, technical challenges with developing and engineering these complex proteins as well as concerns about their safety and efficacy still need to be addressed before they can reach their full potential.

In this GEN webinar, Dr. Jianqing Xu, Head of the Protein Design and Engineering Excellence Center at WuXi Biologics, will discuss tools and strategies for effectively addressing the technical challenges of engineering bispecific and multispecific antibodies. During his talk, he will provide details of the WuXiBody^® and SDArBody^® production platforms and share case studies that demonstrate the value of both for developing novel biotherapeutics with desired protein properties and binding characteristics.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Broadcast Date: November 1, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Recent advances in organoid technology have opened the possibility of revolutionizing basic research, drug discovery and development, and patient treatment. In drug discovery, organoids are a viable alternative to animal models for high-throughput screening assays. For example, scientists have explored the feasibility of using patient-derived organoids to develop and test personalized treatments for some cancer subtypes. However, broad adoption of organoids in drug discovery studies still faces many challenges, such as inconsistent quality, poor yield, slow data acquisition, and inaccurate data processing.

In this GEN webinar, two organoid experts, Dr. Kai Chen at ALIT Biotech and Dr. Kangxin He at Zhejiang University, will discuss optimal strategies for high-throughput drug screening using patient-derived organoids. The experts will share their insights on several key topics:

• Achieving high-quality, high-yield, and reproducible organoid culture using a perfusion-enabled organoid culture system.
• Accelerated 3D organoid imaging to complete a 96-well plate in less than four minutes.
• Accurate identification and characterization of various organoids through AI-powered image processing algorithms.
• Management of cancer patient derived organoids.
• Practical considerations in organoid-based high-throughput drug screening.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelists.

Broadcast Date: October 20, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

For years, the biologics industry has struggled with inefficient microbial expression systems for producing proteins and antibodies that they need to manufacture new biopharmaceuticals. Difficulties with low titers, poor product quality, impurities in samples, and capacity constraints are just some of the challenges that scientists have with legacy systems.

Scientists at KBI Biopharma, led by Erik Nordwald, PhD, worked tirelessly for over two years to develop a novel state-of-the-art microbial cell line development platform that addresses these challenges. The new PUREplatform solution provides all the functionality that scientists need for optimal therapeutic protein production and development. “The results our development team is seeing with PUREplatform are paving the way for our partners to realize microbial drug substance at a fraction of the scales previously needed, and we hope to see this translate into more efficient cost of goods for at-scale manufacturing,” said J.D. Mowery, Chief Executive Officer of KBI Biopharma. KBI’s PUREcoli (part of PUREplatform solution), which will be showcased in this webinar, has been shortlisted as a finalist in the “Accelerating Innovation” category at the CPhI Pharma Awards 2023

In this GEN webinar, Dr. Nordwald will discuss how the groundbreaking PUREplatform improves microbial therapeutic protein expression. You’ll learn how PUREplatform can transform microbial drug substance production at a fraction of the scales previously needed. Specific learning objectives include:

• Understanding the inherent challenges and risks associated with microbial biologic development.

• Gaining insights into the constraints faced during microbial biologics development and strategies to streamline the timeline.

• Discovering how PUREcoli plays a pivotal role in mitigating many of these challenges from the outset.

• Learning how PUREcoli addresses complexities in microbial biologic development, setting the stage for smoother processes down the line.

A live Q&A session will follow the presentation, offering you a chance to pose questions to our expert panelist.

Broadcast Date: October 11, 2023
Time: 8:00 am PT, 11:00 am ET, 17:00 CET

Brain-derived biomarkers of neurodegenerative diseases are important targets for new therapies. In the context of Alzheimer’s disease, scientists are exploring the use of protein biomarkers for early diagnosis, screening, prognosis prediction, and disease monitoring. But these markers are often present at very low concentrations in plasma or serum, much too low for most existing proteomics assays to detect and measure.

In this GEN webinar, Henrik Zetterberg, MD, PhD, an expert in Alzheimer’s disease, will discuss his efforts to discover and validate blood-based biomarkers for various CNS disorders. During his presentation, he will share data from his evaluation of the NULISA immunoassay platform’s ability to detect biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease from serum. You will also hear from Doug Hinerfeld, PhD, who will discuss the NULISA platform’s multiplex and protein marker detection capabilities in more depth.

 

During the presentation we will offer a chance to pose questions to our expert panelists. Any questions submitted during the webinar will be answered at a later date.