Provisional Timetable

(Subject to change)

All talks will be held in the Edward Boyle Auditorium, JdP, St Hilda’s College.

DAY 1 – 03rd April

0745 – 0830: Registration and welcome coffee (JdP foyer)

0830: Housekeeping

0835: Aptamers updates by Dr Muhammad Sohail

0840: INSOAP updates by Dr Sarah Shigdar

0850: Welcome by Professor Günter Mayer

Therapeutics and diagnostics – Chair Julian Tanner

0900: Professor Günter Mayer, University of Bonn, Bonn, Germany
Aptamer therapeutics

0930: Dr Kazumasa Akita, Ribomic Inc, Tokyo, Japan
Alkaline-tolerant RNA aptamers useful to purify acid-sensitive antibodies in neutral conditions

1000: Dr Christine Reinemann, Aptamer Group, York, UK
Flexible monitoring of small molecules with Aptamer affinity reagents

1020: Networking break, posters and exhibition

Therapeutics and diagnostics – Chair Beatrix Suess

1050: Dr Sarah Shigdar, Deakin University, Geelong, VIC, Australia
Bifunctional aptamer-doxorubicin conjugate crosses blood brain barrier and selectively delivers payload to Epithelial Cell Adhesion Molecule positive tumour cells

1120: Dr Marcus Menger, Fraunhofer Institute for Cell Therapy and Immunology, Brandenburg, Germany 
Universal aptamer against superantigens

1140: Dr Kevin Cheung, University of California, Los Angeles, California, USA (+P)
Development of Aptamer-Field-Effect Transistor Sensors: Towards Point of Care

1150: Dr Styliana Philippou, The Cyprus Institute of Neurology & Genetics, Nicosia, Cyprus (+P)
Identification of RNA aptamers for therapeutic oligonucleotide delivery in the heart of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy mice

1200: Professor Fernando Pastor, University of Navarra, Pamplona, Spain (+P)
ICOS costimulation with targeted agonist aptamer at the tumor site enhances CTLA-4 blockade therapy

Biosensors and probes – Chair Günter Mayer

1210: Professor Kevin Plaxco, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
Counting molecules, dodging blood cells: Electrochemical Aptamer-based Sensors Supporting continuous, real-time molecular measurements directly in the living body

1240: Group photo and lunch break

1350: Professor Jennifer Heemstra, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA
Small-molecule detection and enantiopurity measurement using DNA-based sensors

1420: Dr Laura Cerchia, Istituto per l’Endocrinologia e l’Oncologia Sperimentale “G. Salvatore”, Naples, Italy
Aptamers selected on live cells unravel TNBC molecular heterogeneity

1440: Dr Victorial Calzada, Univ de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay
Aptamer-based theranostics

1500: Dr Nako Nakatsuka, Institute for Biomedical Engineering, ETH Zürich, Zurich, Switzerland (+P)
Aptamer-Functionalized Multi-Electrode Arrays for Chemical Sensing in Neuronal Networks

1510: Networking break, posters and exhibition

1540: Flash talks – chair Sarah Shigdar

For presentation abstracts, see ‘Poster Abstracts’

Shujaat Ali (France); Federico Bosetto (Italy); Petr Denissenko (UK); Anne-Mare de Vries (Belgium); Nico Dreymann (Germany); Rezzan Fazlioglu (Turkey); Yunxia Luan (China); Friederike Möller (Germany); Anastasia Novoseltseva (Russia); Beñat Olave (Spain); Carlota Roca (Spain); Wiebke Sabrowski (Germany); Ashwani Sharma (India); Aron Shoara (Canada); Sladjana Slavkovic (Canada); Beatriz Torres-Vázquez (Spain); Yuanyuan Yu (China)

1650: Poster viewing

1740: INSOAP AGM

1810: Aptamers Editorial Board Meeting

1915: Networking dinner (by prior booking or invitation only)

DAY 2 – 04th April

Riboswitches – Chair Jennifer Heemstra

0900: Professor Jörg S Hartig, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany
RNA switches for controlling gene expression in eukaryotic model organisms

0930: Professor Beatrix Suess, Technical University Dramstadt, Dramstadt, Germany
Next-level riboswitch development – Implementation of Capture-SELEX allows fast and easy identification of a new synthetic riboswitch

Chemistry, selection, technologies and innovation-I – Chair Saïd Ismail

1000: Professor Philip Johnson, York University, Toronto, Canada
Fine-tuning the binding affinity of a structure-switching aptamer using dangling nucleotides

1030: Networking break, posters and exhibition

1100: Dr Julian Tanner, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Chemical modifications and therapeutics

1130: Dr Philipp Holliger, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK
Synthetic genetics: beyond DNA and RNA

1200: Dr Philip Webber
Patenting of aptamers

1220: Award presentation

1235: Networking break, posters and exhibition

Chemistry, selection, technologies and innovation-II – Chair Philip Johnson

1320: Ms Lauren Ferreira, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa
Antibodies and aptamers in SELEX: selecting DNA aptamers against a particular hCG epitope using a targeted SELEX strategy

1340: Dr Nebojsa Janjic, SomaLogic, Inc, Boulder, CO, USA
From modified aptamers to multiplexed protein measurements: SOMAscan as a tool for elucidating the proteome

1400: Professor Thomas Schäfer, POLYMAT, University of the Basque Country, Gipuzkoa, Spain
Gating-membranes based on DNA-aptamer sandwich structures

1420: Mr Simon Chi-Chin Shiu, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
The Three Optimizations for Aptamer-Enabled DNA Nanostructures

1440: Miss Maud Savonnet, CEA, LETI MlNATEC Campus, Paris, France (+P)
Detection of troponin I by Surface Plasmon Resonance Imaging based on a sandwich assay using antibodies and aptamers

1450: Mr Rhushabh Maugi, Loughborough University, Leicester, UK (+P)
A “Swiss Army Knife” Approach Using Aptamers and Nanopores

1500: Miss Tanu Bhardwaj, Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, India (+P)
Generation of Aptamers Using SELEX for Detection of Lucentis on Microfluidic Chip

1510: Dr Tarek Mohamed Abd El Aziz, Minia University, Minya, Egypt (+P)
From antibodies to chemical synthetic DNA “aptamers”: Next Generation therapy for In Vitro and In Vivo Modulation of αC-Conotoxin PrXA Pharmacology

1520: Closing remarks by Professor Günter Mayer, discussion and close