2019 Speaker Interviews

Aggregates and Particulates in Protein Formulation: Orthogonal Characterization Methods for a Data-Based Immunogenicity Risk Assessment

Joël Richard, PhD, Head, Technical and Pharmaceutical Operations, MedinCell

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Dr. Joel Richard of MedinCell about immunogenicity risk of aggregates and particulates in protein and the analytical and risk assessment trends industry is following. Dr. Richard is the keynote speaker at the 5th Annual Detection and Characterization of Particulates and Impurities which is taking place on January 15-16, 2019 in San Diego, CA where he will be delivering his talk on “Aggregates and Particulates in Protein Formulation: Orthogonal Characterization Methods for a Data-Based Immunogenicity Risk Assessment”. This conference is being organized as part of the 18th Annual PepTalk which runs from January 14-18, 2018 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Overcoming Implementation Challenges of Novel Drying Technologies and Continuous Manufacture

Satoshi Ohtake, PhD, Senior Director, Pharmaceutical Research and Development, Biotherapeutic Pharmaceutical Sciences, Pfizer, Inc.

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Dr. Satoshi Ohtake of Pfizer about challenges in manufacturing and processing technologies Novel Drying Technologies and where the industry is headed in coming years. Dr. Ohtake is the keynote speaker at the 12th Annual Lyophilization and Emerging Drying Technologies which is taking place on January 15-16, 2019 in San Diego, CA where he will be delivering his talk on “Overcoming Implementation Challenges of Novel Drying Technologies and Continuous Manufacture”. This conference is being organized as part of the 18th Annual PepTalk which runs from January 14-18, 2019 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

2018 Speaker Interviews

Utilities of Biosensor Platforms in Antibody Discovery

Danlin Yang, Ph.D., Scientist, Biophysics, Biotherapeutics Discovery, Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Kent Simmons recently spoke with Dr. Danlin Yang, a Scientist in the Biotherapeutics Discovery group at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, about her upcoming presentation “Utilities of Biosensor Platforms in Antibody Discovery”, to be delivered in the Enhancing Antibody Binding and Specificity meeting at the 2018 Peptalk event.
View the Interview

High-Throughput de novo Computational Protein Design and Its Applications

Gabriel Rocklin, Ph.D., Senior Fellow, Biochemistry & Bioengineering, University of Washington

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Gabriel Rocklin, Senior Fellow, Biochemistry & Bioengineering, University of Washington, prior to his presentation on “High-Throughput de novo Computational Protein Design and Its Applications” at the Seventh Annual Higher-Throughput Protein Production and Characterization conference (January 11-12, 2018 during the 17th Annual PepTalk event in San Diego, CA).
View the Interview

Production of New Proteins: Research Challenges and Automation Solutions

Peter Nollert, Ph.D., Business Director, Research and Development, Bio Data Bridges

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Peter Nollert, Business Director, Research and Development, Bio Data Bridges, prior to his presentation on “Establishing Protein Production without Reinventing the Wheel: ProteinData.Cloud” at the Tenth Annual Engineering Genes and Hosts conference (January 8-9, 2018 during the 17th Annual PepTalk event in San Diego, CA).
View the Interview

CHO Cells, Chromosomal Instability, and Protein Production

Noriko Yamano, Ph.D., Senior Scientist, Manufacturing Technology Association of Biologics; Guest Academic Staff, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Noriko Yamano, Senior Scientist, Manufacturing Technology Association of Biologics and Guest Academic Staff, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University, before her presentation on “The Stability of CHO Genome: Essential for Cell Line Characterization or Not?” at the Fourth Annual CHO Cell Lines conference (January 10-11, 2018 during the 17th Annual PepTalk event in San Diego, CA).
View the Interview

Bispecific Antibodies for Dual Immune Checkpoint Blockade

David E. Szymkowski, Ph.D., Vice President, Cell Biology, Xencor, Inc.

Combinations of checkpoint-blocking antibodies are more efficacious then single inhibitors, but generate greater immune-related toxicities. We reasoned that a bispecific antibody could achieve dual blockade to selectively target tumor-reactive lymphocytes, improving safety and efficacy. We generated multiple dual-checkpoint inhibitors including XmAb20717 (anti-PD1 x anti-CTLA4) that display compelling in vivo activity relative to combinations of monospecific antibodies, suggesting that checkpoint bispecifics may have clinical advantages for the treatment of cancer.
View the Interview

Translating Protein Expression Research to Biotech Startup Success and Production/Purification Goals

Tsafi Danieli, Ph.D., Director, BioGiv Excubator & Head, Protein Expression Facility, Wolfson Centre for Applied Structural Biology, Alexander Silberman Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Mario Lebendiker, Ph.D., Head, Protein Purification Facility, Wolfson Centre for Applied Structural Biology, Alexander Silberman Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Tsafi Danieli and Dr. Mario Lebendiker, Heads of the Protein Expression Facility and Protein Purification Facility, respectively, at Wolfson Centre for Applied Structural Biology, Alexander Silberman Institute of Life Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem before their upcoming training seminar on Basic Technologies in a Protein Production Lab (January 11-12, 2018 during the 17th Annual PepTalk event in San Diego, CA).
View the Interview

2017 Speaker Interviews

Using High-Throughput Techniques to Produce Difficult Targets: Flavivirus NS1, an Updated Case Study

Flavivirus, such as West Nile, Dengue and Zika, represent a serious global threat to human health. We applied high-throughput cloning and expression evaluation techniques and a matrix buffer screen to develop a robust production pipeline for NS1 protein, a multi-functional virulence factor, from several different Flavivirus, which resulted in the determination of crystal structures of full-length, glycosylated NS1.
View the Interview

Protein Synthesis and Regulation of Gene Expression

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. John Dresios of Leidos, Inc. He will present on “A Cell-Free Expression and Purification Platform for Rapid and Flexible Production of Protein Biologics” at the 19th Annual Recombinant Protein Expression and Production conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9-13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Challenges to Improvement in the Therapeutic Index of ADCs in Solid Cancers

Dr. Dixit, Vice President of Research and Development and Global Head of Biologics Safety Assesement at Medimmue recently spoke about his upcoming presentation “Challenges to Improvement in the Therapeutic Index of ADCs in Solid Cancers” at the 4th Annual Antibody-Drug Conjugates Conference in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Development of the Pharmacologically Highly Active Endogenous Protein Stathmin-1 to Treat Chronic Wounds

Stathmin-1 is a small, highly conserved protein, which was identified as an intra-cellular modulator of the eukaryotic cytoskeleton. We overtook development of this pharmacologically potent biologic and have started to investigate its therapeutic potential in a topical formulation to eventually treat chronic, not healing wounds. This presentation highlights our troubleshooting program, which identified and overcame several mistakes from previous development activities, and describes how we will address further clinical issues.
View the Interview

Q&A with Biocatalysis and Bio-Based Chemical Production Speakers

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with leading experts and speakers from the biocatalysis industry about some of key talking points at CHI’s inaugural Biocatalysis and Synthetic Biology conference, taking place January 9-10, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Plant-based Expression and Synthetic Biology

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with leading experts and speakers from the plant-made pharmaceuticals (PMP) industry about some of key talking points at CHI’s inaugural Plant-based Expression and Synthetic Biology conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Synthetic Biology and Protein Therapeutics

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Floyd Romesberg of The Scripps Research Institute about synthetic biology and developing unnatural base pairs for protein therapeutics. He will present on “A Semi-Synthetic Organism with an Expanded Genetic Alphabet” at the 9th Annual Engineering Genes and Hosts conference, taking place January 9-10, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9-13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Emerging Predictive Biomarkers for Cancer Immunotherapy

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Kent Simmons recently spoke with Dr. Sandip Patel, Assistant Professor in the Cancer Immunotherapy Program at the Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego, about his upcoming presentation “Emerging Predictive Biomarkers for Cancer Immunotherapy”, to be delivered in the Engineering Next-Generation Cancer Immunotherapies meeting at the 2017 Peptalk event.
View the Interview

Advantages of Isolating Secreted and Full-length IgG over Antibody Fragments

Yongliang Fang, Researcher, Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College

Kent Simmons of CHI recently spoke with Yongliang Fang, a researcher at Dartmouth College’s Thayer School of Engineering, about his upcoming presentation “Ultra-High Throughput Screening of Soluble, Secreted mAbs against Intact Cancer Cells”, to be delivered in the Emerging Technologies for Antibody Discovery meeting.
View the Interview

Mammalian Cell Expression at National Research Council of Canada

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Yves Durocher of National Research Council Canada about mammalian cell expression. He will present on “Rapid Production of Recombinant Proteins in CHO Cells Using Large-Scale Transfection or Stable Pools” at the 4th Annual Optimizing Expression Platforms conference, taking place January 12-13, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9-13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Bioprocess Monitoring and Analytics

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently interviewed Dr. Rosanne Guijt of University of Tasmania about bioprocess monitoring and analytics. She will present on “Sequential Injection Capillary Electrophoresis for Bioprocess Monitoring” at the Inaugural Bioprocess Analytics conference, taking place January 12-13, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9-13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Understanding Chemical Liabilities in Antibody Lead Selection

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Dr. Shrikant Deshpande of West-Ward Pharmaceuticals about his insights on characterization of biologic and where this field is headed in coming years. Dr. Deshpande is a keynote speaker at the 3rd Annual Characterization of Biotherapeutics taking place January 9-10 in San Diego, CA where he will be delivering his talk on “Understanding Chemical Liabilities in Antibody Lead Selection.” This conference is part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download PDF

Fighting to Cure Food Allergies

Hear the latest work Dr. Basar Bilgicer, Associate Professor, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Notre Dame is doing in the fight to cure food allergies.Dr. Bilgicer will be presenting at PepTalk in the “Protein Purification and Recovery” conference track. Click here to learn more

How can we design new DNA?

Frances Arnold, Ph.D., Dickinson Professor of Chemical Engineering, Bioengineering and Biochemistry, California Institute of Technology

Dr. Frances Arnold is the keynote speaker at PepTalk in the “Biocatalysis and Bio-Based Chemical Production” conference track. Click here to learn more

Codexis Webcast: Rapid Evolution of Enzymes for Pharma Applications

James Lalonde will be a chairperson at PepTalk in the “Biocatalysis and Bio-Based Chemical Production” conference track. Click here to learn more

Extractables & Leachables Safety Information Exchange (ELSIE) Consortium – Update

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Dr. Kim Li of Amgen about challenges in managing Extractables & Leachables and her upcoming keynote presentation “Extractables & Leachables Safety Information Exchange (ELSIE) Consortium – Update” at the 5th Annual Extractables and Leachables conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download PDF

Impact of Interfacial Interactions on the Formation of Particles, Aggregation of Proteins, and Their Prevention: Role of Surface Energetics and Their Application to Container Compatibility and Protein Purification

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Dr. Jinjiang Li of Bristol-Myers Squibb, about challenges in studying protein aggregation and his upcoming presentation “Impact of Interfacial Interactions on the Formation of Particles, Aggregation of Proteins, and Their Prevention”, at the 8th Annual Protein Aggregation and Emerging Analytical Tools conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download PDF

Prediction of Antibody Stability in Lyophilized Solids by Hydrogen Deuterium Exchange with Mass Spectrometric Analysis (HX-MS)

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Kathleen Abadie of Genentech about predicting protein stability in the solid state and her upcoming presentation “Prediction of Antibody Stability in Lyophilized Solids by Hydrogen Deuterium Exchange with Mass Spectrometric Analysis (HX-MS)”, 10th Annual Lyophilization and Emerging Drying Technologies conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download PDF

New Case Studies and Strategies for Manufacturing, Scale-Up and Tech Transfer

Cambridge Healthtech Institute recently spoke with Alexander Herbert of West-Ward Pharmaceuticals, about his upcoming presentation “New Case Studies and Strategies for Manufacturing, Scale-Up and Tech Transfer”, at the 10th Annual Lyophilization and Emerging Drying Technologies conference, taking place January 10-11, 2017 as part of the 16th Annual PepTalk event which runs from January 9- 13, 2017 in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download PDF

2016 Speaker Interviews

Gene Editing, IDLV and Pluripotent Stem Cells

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Ann Nguyen recently interviewed Jiing-Kuan Yee of City of Hope National Medical Center. Dr. Yee shares his keynote presentation on “Use Integration-Defective Lentiviral Vectors to Measure the Off-Target Effect of Gene Editing” at the Engineering Genes, Vectors, Constructs and Clones conference taking place January 18-19, 2016, as part of the 15th Annual PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Alternative Protein Expression Systems and Integral Membrane Proteins

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Ann Nguyen recently interviewed Nicola Burgess-Brown of the University of Oxford. Dr. Burgess-Brown shares her keynote presentation on “Expressing Human Intracellular and Integral Membrane Proteins for Structural and Functional Studies” at the Recombinant Protein Expression conference taking place January 19-20, 2016, as part of the 15th Annual PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

High-Throughput Cloning, Vector Selection and the “Optimization Ceiling”

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Ann Nguyen recently interviewed Andrea Throop of Arizona State University. Dr. Throop shares her presentation on “Selecting the Optimal Vector for High-Throughput Cloning and Protein Arrays” at the Engineering Genes, Vectors, Constructs and Clones conference taking place January 18-19, 2016, as part of the 15th Annual PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Targeting MUC16-Positive Malignancies with the Novel TRAIL-Based Cancer Therapeutic Meso64-TR3

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Mary Ruberry recently interviewed Dr. Dirk Spitzer, Instructor of Surgery at Washington University School of Medicine about his upcoming presentation “Targeting MUC16-Positive Malignancies with the Novel TRAILBased Cancer Therapeutic Meso64-TR3” in San Diego.
View the Interview | Download the PDF

A Pipeline to Select Human Antibodies in vivo Against Defined Cancer Targets

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Kent Simmons recently spoke with Fortunato Ferrara of the University of New Mexico about his upcoming presentation “A Pipeline to Select Human Antibodies in vivo Against Defined Cancer Targets” at the Emerging Technologies for Antibody Discovery and Engineering conference taking place January 21-22, 2016, as part of the 15th Annual PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview | Download the PDF

Therapy of Advanced Solid Cancers with Sacituzumab Govitecan (IMMU-132), a Novel ADC Targeting Trop-2

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Mary Ruberry spoke with Dr. David M. Goldenberg of Garden State Cancer Center and Immunomedics, Inc. Dr. Goldenberg will be presenting at the 3rd Annual “Antibody-Drug Conjugates” conference taking place January 19-20, 2016, as part of PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Sweet Delivery of the Bitter – Using Carbohydrate-Targeting Antibodies for Tumor-Specific Delivery of Cytotoxic Drugs

Cambridge Healthtech Institute’s Mary Ruberry spoke with Felix Hart of Glycotope GmbH. Felix Hart will be presenting at the 3rd Annual “Antibody-Drug Conjugates” conference taking place January 19-20, 2016, as part of PepTalk in San Diego, CA.
View the Interview

Blood-Brain Barrier Penetrating IgG-Fusion Proteins for the Treatment of Lysosomal Storage Disorders

Cambridge Healthtech Institute's Mary Ruberry spoke with Dr. Ruben Boado, Vice President of R&D at ArmaGen, Inc. about engineering enzyme therapeutics to penetrate the blood-brain barrier, the topic of his upcoming keynote presentation at the 12 Annual "Recombinant Protein Therapeutics" conference at PepTalk in San Diego.
View the Interview | Download the PDF