SAVE THE DATE
May 9, 10 and 11
1st Immunogenicity – Determinates and Correlates
Providence, RI
Click here to see the preliminary agenda.
ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Chair
Annie De Groot, University of Rhode Island
Advisory Board
Eric Furfine
Terry Goletz, Amgen
Chris Bailey-Kellogg, Dartmouth
Leslie Cousens, EpiVax Inc.
Daniela Verthelyi, FDA
Eric Wakshull, Genentech
Sara Brett, GlaxoSmithKline
Bonita Rup, Pfizer
Michael Brehm, UMass
David Scott, Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences
Anish Suri, Bristol Myers Squibb
Nick Marsh, Adnexus
Andy Glasebrook, Eli Lilly
Dale Greiner, UMass
Amy Rosenberg, FDA
Naren Chirmule, Amgen
Michel Awwad, Pfizer
Denice Spero, University of Rhode Island
Alan Rothman, University of Massachusetts
Preliminary Agenda
Session I: Determinants – Predicting Immunogenicity
Session Chair and Panel Leaders: Bonnie Rup, Pfizer and Terry Goletz, Amgen
Session II: Correlates – Biomarkers and Model Systems
Session Chair and Panel Leaders: Michel Brehm, UMass and David Scott, USUHS
Session III: Risk Mitigation – Preclinical Studies and Clinical Studies
Session Chair and Panel Leaders: Eric Furfine and Naren Chirmule, Amgen
Session IV: Case Studies
To be held in conjunction with the TRIAD Toolkit and Tregitope Meeting May 11th.
SPONSORSHIP QUESTIONS:
Please contact Karen Sorento: karen.l.sorrento@gmail.com
REGISTRATION:
Click here to register!
HOTEL ACCOMMODATIONS:
Book your hotel room now!
Please contact Patrick Lowney with any questions: plowney.uri@gmail.com
ABSTRACT SUBMISSION:
Abstracts due March 15
Please submit abstracts as a word document to Patrick Lowney: plowney.uri@gmail.com
Authors of selected abstracts will be notified by April 1
TRIAD Toolkit Training and Pilot Project Grant Announcement
On May 11, 2011 the Institute for Immunology and Informatics (iCubed) at the University of Rhode Island’s Providence campus will hold a training session on vaccine design. This training will include hands-on training to use state of the art immunoinformatics tools to predict vaccine candidates. The purpose of the Pilot Projects is to train new researchers to use advanced immunoinformatics tools in order to accelerate vaccine design in the area of human immunology and Category A, B and C priority pathogens, their toxins and other emerging infectious diseases. The program is designed to facilitate investigators to obtain “preliminary data” and to be successful at securing future research grants. Ph.D.s who attend this training will be eligible to apply for a Pilot Project grant through the Translational Immunology Research and Accelerated Vaccine Development (TRIAD) program. $150,000 is available and it is anticipated 2-3 grants will be awarded.
Requirements for applying for a TRIAD Pilot Project Grant:
•Attendance at the TRIAD Toolkit training session
•Ph.D. (postdoctoral fellow or faculty) but no prior training in immunoinformatics or vaccine design
•Have the skills, knowledge and resources necessary to carry out the proposed research
•Topics must be related to human immunology and vaccine development and focus on Category A, B and C priority pathogens, their toxins and other emerging or re-emerging infectious diseases. http://www3.niaid.nih.gov/topics/emerging/list.htm
•Commitment from the grantees home institution or laboratory
Format for Submission of Pilot Project Proposals:
•Cover Page with: U19 grant # and PI’s name, Pilot Project Title, Pilot Project Leaders Name and Institution, Abstract
•Detailed budget & justification (PHS 398 pgs 4-5); include both direct and indirect costs; include proposed % effort/months effort for the Project Leader and any other key personnel.
•NIH-type Biosketches for proposed Project Leader and any other key personnel; in the “Research Support” section, include % effort/months effort for active funding.
•Description of proposed work (strict 4-page limit) to include:
1.Rationale (how the project will advance human immunology; Project Leader’s prior work in human immunology; how the Project Leader will obtain independent funds using the pilot data to continue project in future; how the CCHI program will benefit from this project – is there value added? Why use of any animals is a good thing, e.g. hu-mice, NHPs)
2.Preliminary data
3.Description of proposed work
4.References
•Human Subjects section (follow PHS 398 instructions)
•Vertebrate animals section (follow PHS 398 instructions)
•Foreign site information
To Attend the TRIAD Toolkit Training Session:
Hotel accommodations are available at Hotel Providence. Secure rooms soon as they go fast! For questions please contact Patrick Lowney at plowney.uri@gmail.com or (401) 277-5408.
To Submit a Pilot Project Proposal:
All prospective grantees must attend the TRIAD training session on May 11, 2011 at the URI Feinstein Providence Campus. The grant proposals are due to Denice Spero (denice.spero@gmail.com) and Annie De Groot (dr. annie.degroot@gmail.com) by June 20, 2011.
Second Immunoinformatics and Computational Immunology Workshop (ICIW 2011)
http:/ailab.cs.iastate.edu/iciw2011/
Chicago, IL, U.S.A. August 1-3, 2011
To be held in conjunction with the ACM International Conference on Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (ACM-BCB)
Naturally emerging or reemerging diseases pose some of the most serious threats to human health. Computational methods are urgently needed for developing new vaccines, therapies, and models to improve our understanding of the immune system, and reliable tools for focusing experimental investigations.
The workshop aims to attract researchers from computer science, information science, biomedicine, bioinformatics, systems biology, and immunology to share research challenges, research results, methods, and advances in immunoinformatics and computational immunology. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
- Structural Immunoinformatics
- Epitope analysis and prediction
- MHC-peptide binding site analysis and prediction
- Immunoinformatics Databases, Knowledge Bases, Ontologies
- Computational modeling of immune system
- Analysis and prediction of minor histocompatibility antigens
- Predictive models for organ transplantation
- Immunogenomics
- Vaccine design
- Artificial immune systems and other biologically-inspired paradigms
- Multi-agent based modeling of immune response
- Allergenicity prediction
- Gene expression changes in adaptive immune response
- Comparative approaches to immunology
Important Dates
Paper Submission deadline: March 18, 2011
Poster Submission deadline: April 15, 2011
Notification of acceptance: April 22, 2011
Camera-ready of accepted papers: May 1, 2011
Author Instructions
Authors should prepare a Portable Document Format (PDF) version of their full paper. Regular papers must be no longer than 10 pages, papers on evolving research and work in progress should be no longer than 5 pages, following the ACM two-column format for conference proceedings (http://www.acm.org/sigs/publications/proceedings-templates) All accepted papers will be included in a Workshop Proceedings to be published on line and included with the conference proceedings on the CD. Authors of selected papers will have an opportunity to extend their workshop papers for publication (subject to peer review) in Journal of Immunological Methods and Immunome Research Journal.
Papers should be submitted electronically (in PDF form) through “EasyChair” at: https:/www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=iciw2011
Poster Submission
We invite authors to submit one-page extended abstracts. Submissions should be sent to yasser@cs.iastate.edu before May 15, 2011. Notification of acceptance will be given by May 31, 2011. Accepted abstracts will be selected for oral or poster presentation and will be included in the workshop proceedings in CD.
Organizing committee
Vasant Honavar (Iowa State University, USA))
Vladimir Brusic (Harvard University)
Yasser EL-Manzalawy (Iowa State University, USA)
Program Committee (Tentative)
Becca Asquith (Imperial College London, UK)
Anne De Groot (URI Institute for Immunology and Informatics, USA)
Salvador Eugenio Caoili (University of the Philippines Mani)
Can Kesmir (Utrecht University, Netherlands)
Andrzej Kloczkowski (Ohio State University, USA)
Santo Motta (University of Catania, Italy)
German Nudelman (Mount Sinai School of Medicine, USA)
Bjoern Peters (La Jolla institute of allergy and immunology, USA)
Nikolai Petrovsky (Flinders University, Australia)
Julia Ponomarenko (University of California, San Diego, USA)
Johannes Sollner (Emergentec biodevelopment GmbH, Austria)
Anna Tramontano (Sapienza University of Rome, Italy)
Guanglan Zhang (Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, USA)
Dr. Yasser EL-Manzalawy
e-mail: yasser@azhar.edu.eg, yasser@iastate.edu
web: www.cs.iastate.edu/~yasser
Assistant Professor
Systems and Computer Engineering
Al-Azhar University
Cairo, Egypt
Visiting Research Associate
Artificial Intelligence Research Laboratory
Center for Computational Intelligence, Learning,& Discovery
Department of Computer Science
215 Atanasoff Hall
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa 50011-1040
Past Events
Neglected Tropical Diseases Workshop Set for January [January 4-21]
The Institute for Immunology and Informatics (I’Cubed) will hold a training session targeting neglected tropical diseases over three weeks in January 2011 at the URI Providence Biotechnology Center.
I’Cubed selected 13 fellows for the training. Selections were based on the applicant’s current involvement in research on neglected tropical diseases, prior doctoral or equivalent training in immunology or a related area in the vaccine development field and substantial commitment from the applicant’s home institution to their future research career.
Keynote speakers include:
Professor Maria Botazzi, George Washington University
Professor Michael Cappello, Yale School of Medicine
Professor Diane McMahon-Pratt, Yale School of Public Health
Professor Steve Williams, Smith College
Professor Alan Rothman, University of Massachusetts Medical School
Professor Matt Waldor, Harvard University
Professor Loren Fast, Division of Hematology/Oncology at Brown University
Mini-Symposium on HIV/AIDS [November 8]
An interdisciplinary program to bring forth the different issues in global health through the lens of HIV/AIDS around the world.
CONTACT: Shahla.yekta@gmail.com
THERE IS NO REGISTRATION FEE
WHERE: University of Rhode Island (Kingston Campus) Galanti Lounge
4th Annual Vaccine Renaissance Conference [October 21-23]
The 4th Vaccine Renaissance is dedicated to creating a dynamic interchange, by bridging disciplines (immunoinformatics, vaccine delivery, clinical vaccine trials and basic research) while offering multiple opportunities for contact between academic researchers and members of the vaccine R&D biotech industry.
Speakers will describe new approaches to developing vaccines for today’s most significant infectious disease threats such as influenza, neglected tropical diseases, multidrug resistant tuberculosis, and HIV.
CONTACT: Contact.ICubed@gmail.com
REGISTER NOW!
WHERE: University of Rhode Island (Feinstein Providence Campus), 80 Washington Street, Providence, RI 02903 & The Hotel Providence
www.uri.edu/home/visitors/Map/ProvidenceCampus.pdf
Smart Vaccines for Entrepreneurs Class
We are excited to announce that the Institute for Immunology and Informatics (I’Cubed) will conduct a workshop for scientists and business students to be trained in the principals of biotechnology startup. The area of focus is vaccine design and businesses that support vaccine research and development. Participants will develop knowledge related to the development of ‘smart vaccines’ and infectious disease diagnostics and will be trained by experienced and successful vaccine and business experts. The goal of this program is to bring together scientists and business-savvy entrepreneurs who have the drive and desire to start health care-related businesses in Rhode Island.
The program will feature presentations such as:
• Practical uses of immunology and related market categories: vaccines, diagnostics, and delivery systems.
• Operating a Biotechnology company and options for funding a new company (presented by RI-based CEOs and COOs).
• Businesses that support vaccines which are not available in RI such as protein production and diagnostics.
• How to write a business plan including marketing and sales management, market analysis, supply chain management and financials.
Participants will be eligible to compete for a $2500 cash prize given to the student (or team) who has the best idea and business plan for a vaccine related start- up company. This award can be used for seed funding to establish a web site or apply toward incorporation fees.
WHO SHOULD APPLY: Participants should have business training OR a background in biology, technology or immunology. Participants must have the drive and ambition to start a company in RI and to expand RI’s knowledge economy.
ORGANIZERS: Denice Spero, Ph.D. and Annie De Groot, M.D. Research Professors, I’Cubed
CONTACT: Contact.ICubed@gmail.com
THERE IS NO REGISTRATION FEE
WHERE: University of Rhode Island (Feinstein Providence Campus), 80 Washington Street, Providence, RI 02903 www.uri.edu/home/visitors/Map/ProvidenceCampus.pdf
Vaccine News
