Dr. Debora Souza da Costa, a seasoned scientist with over 20 years of expertise in genetics, biomarkers, biosamples, and clinical operations. Holding a PhD in Pharmacology, she honed her skills at Roche’s Genetics and Genomics laboratories. Over the past 7 years, Dr. Costa has excelled as a Senior Biosample Project Leader, orchestrating biosample strategies for clinical trials. Her extensive experience spans the entire spectrum of clinical development, seamlessly integrating science into operational activities. Driven by a profound passion for advancing Personalized Medicine, she remains committed to enhancing the lives of patients.
Dr. Angela Vasaturo is the Director of Scientific Affairs at Ultivue. Prior to Ultivue, Angela was a Senior Researcher in Dr. Jerome Galon’s Laboratory of Integrative Cancer Immunology at the Cordeliers Research Center. In 2012, Angela was among the first postdocs in Europe to be involved in the development of multiplex IHC and multispectral imaging and analysis of up to six immunofluorescence markers, and today is considered a leading European expert in multiplex IHC techniques, digital pathology, spatial biology and tissue imaging.
Priyank Patel is a Senior Scientist in the Department of Immunology & Respiratory Discovery Research at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. In this capacity he works in the Molecular Histopathology Lab where he implements computational approaches to perform integrative analysis of data generated by High-Plex/-Omics platforms in order to aide drug discovery and identify novel biomarkers. Priyank holds a PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology from State University of New York. Prior to moving to Boehringer Ingelheim, Priyank worked for a biotechnology start-up in Brooklyn, NY developing an immunohistochemistry-based biomarker test for CDK4/6 inhibitors such as Ibrance. He also supported drug discovery efforts for a hormone receptor status agnostic liposomal:peptide based therapeutic for breast cancer treatment.
Dr. Nathalie Steinhoff is a Biomarker Scientist and Group Leader for Pharmacology & Toxicology in the field of Cancer Immunotherapy and Inflammation at Numab Therapeutics AG. Numab Therapeutics AG applies a proprietary antibody discovery and engineering technology to generate highly potent and stable antibody Fv fragments as building blocks to create multispecific antibody fragment-based therapeutics. In her role, Nathalie supports non-clinical and clinical development and implements biomarker and experimental medicine strategies for compounds in the portfolio. Prior to her current role, she investigated the mode of action of T-cell bispecific antibodies, with a focus on safety and acquired resistance mechanisms at Roche. Her research in this area dissected the cellular and molecular players of T Cell Bispecific antibody-mediated Cytokine Release Syndrome. She earned her PhD in Medical Sciences from the University of Fribourg in collaboration with the Roche Innovation Center Zurich, where her research focused on the analysis of the tumor immune contexture and T-cell infiltration in poorly immune-infiltrated gastric cancer induced by pharmaceutical intervention
Louis is the CSO and Management Board Member of JJP Biologics, an innovative new Polish Company backed by the Starak family. JJP Biologics develops the next generation of novel therapeutic biologics around personalized medicine and companion diagnostics (JJP Biologics: Overview | LinkedIn). Louis obtained his Ph.D. in Biochemistry at the University of Amsterdam. He was the founder of various companies focused on the generation and development of therapeutic monoclonal antibodies, primarily in the field of cancer and inflammation. Louis is an author of over 360 publications in international scientific journals in the field of medical immunology/biotechnology and an inventor at more than 20 patent applications.
Manlio Vinciguerra is European Research Area (ERA) Chair at the Medical University Varna; and holds Faculty positions at the Liverpool John Moores University and at the University of Liverpool. He obtained a PhD in Internal Medicine from the University of Geneva in 2004, followed by post-doctoral training at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL). He has been Group Leader/Associate Professor at the Foundation for Liver Research and at the University College London (UCL) until 2016. He then led a 6.5 M euro project awarded by the European Development Research Fund (ERDF) to investigate the molecular determinants of aging, at the International Clinical Research Center (FNUSA-ICRC), Brno, Czech Republic. Manlio Vinciguerra’s research revolves around epigenetics, metabolism and aging, with a focus on the progression of liver diseases from fatty liver to hepatocellular carcinoma. He currently leads a multiinstitutional government-funded research program on the use of circulating histones for cancer and cardiovascular patient stratification.
Collin is a Scientist at EpigenDx in product and business development. He graduated from the Pennsylvania State University in 2023 with his Ph.D. in Plant Biology with a focus in genetics, specifically in the accumulation and biogenesis of microRNAs and secondary small interfering RNAs.
Prof. Daniel Royston is a Consultant Haematopathologist at the University of Oxford with a specialist interest in myeloid blood cancers. His research focuses on quantitative image-based approaches to improve understanding of the initiation and progression of blood cancers arising in bone marrow. His group develops improved strategies to monitor therapeutic response in myeloproliferative neoplasms and support the evaluation of novel anti-fibrotics. Prof. Royston is a Consultant Clinical Advisor to Ground Truth Labs. GTL is a leader in AI-powered algorithms for the quantification of spatial biomarkers from digital pathology images, to uncover deep biological insights into disease and accelerate drug development.
Emmanuel Valentin is Vice President, Translational Medicine at ImChek Therapeutics, leading the design and execution of translational medicine strategies to develop and measure biomarkers associated with the clinical mechanism of action and drug response of ImCheck programs. Prior to joining ImCheck in 2018, Dr. Valentin was R&D Head of Diaccurate, a spin-off from Institut Pasteur, in charge of developing a monoclonal antibody for the treatment of infectious diseases and cancer. Prior to that, he was CSO at Aterovax, where he was responsible for the discovery, validation and clinical evaluation of new diagnostic tests for the prediction of cardiovascular diseases. He has also held different positions in preclinical development at Genoway and Diaxonit. Dr. Valentin received his PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Nice Sophia-Antipolis.
Patrick Brossard has been working for over 20 years in the developments of products (e.g., small molecules, peptides, antibodies) across a wide range of indications, mainly in early clinical drug development stage, using different routes of administrations. During his career, his main focus was to optimised the dosing regimen of products by combining pharmacokinetics and biomarkers data. He is currently working at Sobi as director of clinical pharmacology and provides pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics and biomarkers expertise to several programs, such as rare diseases, immunology and blood disorders. He has extensive experience with regulatory agencies such as FDA, EMA, PDMA or CDE.
Robert is a Clinical Lecturer at the University of Oxford, undertaking post-doctoral research alongside higher specialist training in medical oncology. Prior to this, he complete a DPhil (PhD) in Prof Ben Fairfax’s research group at the MRC Weatherall Institute of Molecular Medicine at the University of Oxford, funded by The Wellcome Trust. During this time he examined T cell repertoire and transcriptomic changes in patients with cancer following treatment with immune checkpoint blockade, uncovering several key findings which have been published in Nature Medicine and Science Immunology. His research won the McElwain/President’s Prize from the Association of Cancer Physicians. He also has an interest in medical education and is a Fellow and Director of Graduate Entry Medicine at Worcester College, University of Oxford.
The prevalence of obesity and type 2 diabetes (T2D) has risen dramatically for decades and is expected to rise further with a growing number of sedentary lifestyles. Obesity increases the risks of T2D, cardiovascular diseases and cancers. Depending on BMI and associated risk factors lifestyle changes are available for excess weight loss and prevention of T2D. My research focuses on identifying epigenetic markers that can predict the benefit of lifestyle changes.
Christopher Peters went to medical school in Leeds and after completing basic surgical training moved to Cambridge to carry out a PhD with Professor Rebecca Fitzgerald. During his PhD he developed a four gene signature to predict outcome in oesophageal adenocarcinoma which was validated in 371 independent cases. He also set up the OCCAMS collaboration which went on to be selected to run the International Cancer Genome Consortium's Whole Genome sequencing project in oesophageal adenocarcinoma. OCCAMS has now recruited in excess of 4000 patients and resulted in over 35 publications including in Nature (2 papers), Nature Genetics (4 papers) and Nature Communications (4 papers).
After moving to London to complete his higher surgical training he was appointed as a Clinical Senior Lecturer and Consultant Upper GI surgeon at Imperial College London with a specialist interest in transitioning new technologies to the patient. As the Biomarker lead for the NIHR London IVD Co-operative he has a programme built around trying to better understand which Biomarkers are likely to achieve clinical adoption- aiming to bridge the gap between the millions spent on Biomarker discovery and validation and the handful that achieve clinical success.
Dr Sreejith Raveendran is currently a Senior Lecturer in Biotechnology at the School of Health and Life Sciences, Teesside University, UK. He worked as a Project Coordinator for the India-Japan Bio nano mission phase-II project for the Collaborative research and education program at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi (IITD), has been pursuing cutting-edge research and teaching in the field of nanobiotechnology, and targeted theranostics via several multidisciplinary biological platforms since 2007. His prime areas of research include but are not limited to personalised medicine, nanomolecular targeting, biosensor development and novel therapeutics for cancers. He completed his PhD in Bionanoscience fusion under a MEXT fellowship from Japan and did 4.5 years of Postdoctoral research in cancer nanotechnology at Bio-Nano Electronics Research Centre, Toyo University, Japan. Later, he was awarded with Marie Sklodowska Curie Actions Individual Fellowship (European Commission) for Glioma drug research and moved to the University of Brighton, UK. In his early career, he worked as a Research Associate in Infection Pharmacology at AstraZeneca India Pvt. Ltd., for drug discovery research against tuberculosis and served as a Junior Research Associate in the Bioresources division of Abl Biotechnologies Ltd., India for extraction and biopharmaceutical applications of marine products and secondary metabolites. He received several awards including IAAM young scientist award in 2018, the Nanosmat prize in 2014 and much extramural funding, including 2 prestigious global grants, and has published 23 research papers, 2 review papers, 2 book chapters, and presented 25+ international conferences, symposiums, and invited talks, so far. Sreejith has established an outstanding international research network with various premier research institutes and universities across US, UK, India, Europe, Japan, Singapore and Australia. Sreejith’s main scientific goal is to develop a therapeutic cancer nano vaccine and a wearable nanosensor for early-stage detection of cancers in conjunction with Artificial Intelligence. Using his sound knowledge in nanobiotechnology, nanofabrication, material science, cancer cell biology, microbiology, and immunology, he is interested to pursue more dvanced studies in disease targeting, bio-medical technology and bionanoscience.
Maria Dermit is a Computational Biologist in Novo Nordisk Research Centre Oxford where she works closely with translational teams identifying and elucidating biomarker mechanisms of action using different omics and ML approaches. Before joining Novo, she played a crucial role in several teams in biotech spearheading the implementation of computational biology pipelines across the value chain.
Ian Pike is the Chief Scientific Officer at Proteome Sciences and has over 30 years’ experience working in the diagnostics and biotechnology sectors. Since joining Proteome Sciences in 2002 he has held a number of roles covering intellectual property management, business development, operational management and is now focused on leading the Company’s scientific strategy to offer clients a flexible, high-quality service.
Thomas Göhl is a Market Development Manager at Roche Diagnostics Europe. He leads Europe- & Latin America-wide pilot projects in hospitals to evaluate digital algorithms & clinical decision support systems with a specific focus on building new business models & quantifying health economic outcomes in multiple healthcare systems. His passion in digital transformation & international health economics is based on more than 7 years of expertise in pharmaceutical brand management & strategy consulting.
Karen is operational leader of the Clinical PD Biomarker Group at the Institute of Cancer Research based at Sutton. The Good Clinical Practice compliant Clinical PD Biomarker group develops, validates and implements fit-for-purpose assays for the evaluation of pharmacodynamic biomarkers for academic, charity and commercially sponsored Phase I clinical trials of new oncology agents. Karen also manages the dedicated PD processing team that process clinical samples from trials at the ICR / Royal Marsden’s Drug Development Unit prior to PD analysis. Before joining the ICR in 2012, Karen obtained a BSc (Hons) in Biochemistry with Toxicology and a PhD in Molecular Toxicology from the University of Surrey and then embarked on a successful 12 year molecular toxicology research career focused on investigating nuclear receptors associated with prevention of chemical insult.
Pan Du, PhD, is the Co-founder, president and CTO at Predicine. Pan is an expert in nextgeneration sequencing, bioinformatics, and oncology diagnostics. He has developed multiple widely used bioinformatics analysis software and has authored numerous publications, including several 1st authorship manuscripts that are cited over thousands of times. Prior to Predicine, Pan was a principal scientist at Roche Diagnostics and Senior Computational Biologist at Genentech. he was previously an Assistant Professor at Biomedical Informatics Center at Northwestern University. Pan holds a PhD with distinction in both Bioinformatics and Electrical Engineering from Iowa State University.
Valerie Balme is Associate Director, Pharma Business Development at Veracyte. She has over 10 years of experience working in the diagnostics and biotechnology industries. First at Ipsogen, then at Qiagen and HalioDx and now with Veracyte, she has held several roles covering customer service, manufacturing and operations management and is currently focused on business development in Veracyte’s Biopharma Business Unit offering partners a flexible and high-quality service.
