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Boston QSP November 2018 Event Announcement

Boston- Please join us on Wednesday, November 14th, 2018 for an evening of sharing, learning, and socializing with fellow Boston QSP community members at the Boston QSP November Event "Quantitative & Systems Pharmacology (QSP) in Drug Development."


The event will feature a presentation titled "Development and Application of Systems Modeling Capabilities for Drug and Vaccine R&D in a Global Health Setting: Science & Administration" by our distinguished guest speaker Dr. Karim Azer. The event will be chaired by Dr. Bree Aldridge, Assistant Professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. Dr. Aldridge is also one of the Scientific Advisors at Boston QSP. The talk will be followed by a mixer and reception where attendees can enjoy great company and conversation with fellow community members over selected craft beers and food from a local small business.

Registration is free but RSVP is required. The event is sponsored by Novartis. The Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC) is the venue sponsor.

Agenda

5:00-5:30 PM: Registration (outside Havana Room)


5:30-6:20 PM: Presentation and Q&A. Presentation title: Development and Application of Systems Modeling Capabilities for Drug and Vaccine R&D in a Global Health Setting: Science & Administration (Havana Room)


6:20-7:30 PM: Mixer & Reception (Venture Café, a few steps down the hallway from the Havana room)


Venue: Cambridge Innovation Center, 1 Broadway, Cambridge.


RSVP here. Limited seats.

* Please do not hesitate to RSVP on the waiting list if the RSVP is full as some guests "un-RSVP" as the event gets closer.


Speaker Detail:

Dr. Azer is is the head of the quantitative systems pharmacology (QSP) and DMPK modeling at the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute. His work is focused on leveraging the spectrum of bioinformatics, systems biology, QSP and DMPK modeling approaches, and data analytics, to address the translational medicine needs of the institute, in the areas of tuberculosis, malaria, diarrheal and enteric diseases, and maternal neonatal health. Karim’s efforts are also dedicated to the development of supportive computational and mathematical approaches and pipelines to enable robust in-silico simulations and visualizations of models and model outputs.


Dr. Azer received his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at NYU, after obtaining an M.S. in Applied Mathematics from the Courant Institute at NYU, and a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science from Rutger University. He has worked in the pharmaceutical industry for over 20 years, employing a wide variety of modeling, both mechanistic and empirical, and computer science approaches to address drug discovery and development questions in R&D. Prior to joining the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute, Dr. Azer formed and headed the QSP group, supporting programs across several disease areas including immunology, rare diseases, cardiovascular and oncology at Sanofi. Previously, he was at Merck, where he established a quantitative group spanning a broad range of computational approaches to drug discovery, development and translational medicine. He has served on a number of professional societies such as American College of Clinical Pharmacology (ACCP), American Society of Mechanical Engineering (ASME), IEEE, Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), and International Society of Pharmacometrics (ISOP), and continues to be active in the community.


Abstract:

Mathematical biology and pharmacology models are increasingly utilized in drug and vaccine development, recognizing the need for improving the probability of success or reducing the cost of development. More mechanistic, quantitative systems pharmacology (QSP) models are being leveraged to aid in the identification of novel targets in early research, in the translational medicine activities for bringing molecules into the clinic, achieving proof of mechanism, and understanding variability in response to novel compounds in later clinical development. Bioinformatics, and systems biology models and analyses present a data-driven opportunity to leverage big data for informing the development of disease model scope in QSP, in addition to informing genotype-phenotype disease characteristics. This talk will provide an overview of 1) the development and application of QSP models for drug and vaccine research and development, 2) the evolving strategy and applications of QSP as a computational modeling platform at the Gates MRI, important enabling tools, and the necessary collaborative ecosystem for successful implementation. A high level representation of the platforms the QSP team at Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute has been building will also be presented. The talk will close with an in-depth look at a QSP model, its development, and application.

 

About Boston QSP


Boston QSP is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose mission is to foster the sharing of QSP knowledge, challenges, solutions, and opportunities to advance the field​ as an interdisciplinary community in Boston.





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