Meet the Experts Transporter Conference Budapest 2014

BLOOMER, Jackie C.

Biography

Jackie Bloomer has over 25 yrs experience in preclinical Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics (DMPK) with expertise in enzyme methodologies, extrapolation of in vitro data and application of physiologically based pharmacokinetic models. She has implemented in vitro methodologies and strategies in both drug discovery and development environments to assess the risk of clinical drug-drug interactions. She has represented DMPK on drug development project teams from a variety of therapeutic areas and has been responsible for the strategic implementation of scientific initiatives in preclinical DMPK, including the application of modelling and simulation approaches. Jackie is currently a Director in DMPK at GSK leading a team responsible for the mechanistic understanding of drug absorption, distribution, metabolism and excretion and the extrapolation of this knowledge to characterise drug disposition and drug interaction risks. Her team apply a wide range of in vitro tools to understand the drug metabolising enzymes and drug transporters involved in the elimination of GSK drugs. In vitro-in vivo extrapolation techniques are used to make an assessment of mechanistic drug-drug interaction risks and dynamic modelling approaches are deployed for quantitative predictions. She is co-chair of the Drug Interaction Advisory Committee within GSK which has the remit of advising project teams on clinical drug interaction issues.

BRODIN, Birger, PhD

Biography

Birger Brodin heads the research group "Drug Transporters in ADME" and the Cell Culture Core Facility at the Department of Pharmacy, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. The focus of the research group is the study of membrane transporters and their role in uptake and excretion of drugs and prodrugs across barrier tissues. Birger Brodin is currently investigating how drugs and endogenous substrates pass the small intestine and the blood-brain barrier, and how transport proteins affect this process. Birger Brodin is the author of > 70 scientific articles and book chapters, and several popular science articles, has given > 25 invited talks and is ad hoc referee at > 15 scientific journals.

BROWN Colin, PhD

Biography

Dr Colin Brown was awarded a B.Sc and Ph.D in Physiology and Pharmacology from the University of St Andrews Scotland. He then was a Royal Society European Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, followed by a Wellcome Trust Senior Fellowship in Biomedical Sciences at the University of Manchester.  Until recently, Colin was an Associate Professor at the University of  Newcastle where he focussed on developing in vitro models to study drug transport, drug interactions and toxicity in  kidney, developing  the aProximate in vitro PTC model.  In 2018, Dr Brown joined  Newcells Biotech as Director of ADMET Technologies. 

GRINDSTAFF, Kent, PhD

Biography

Mr. Grindstaff will act as the chairman of the 2nd Day of the conference. With more than 12 years experience in early-stage drug development and transporter biology at Biopharmaceutical and Contract Research organizations, Dr. Grindstaff manages SOLVO’s operations in the Untied States and Canada since June 2012. Prior to joining SOLVO USA, he was head of research at Optivia Biotechnology, a transporter focused CRO and Biotechnology company based in Menlo Park, CA, USA. From 2000 to 2010, he held numerous scientific positions, most recently as Principal Investigator, at XenoPort Inc., Santa Clara, CA, USA. Dr. Grindstaff has a Ph.D. in Molecular Cell Biology and Biochemistry from Washington University, Saint Louis, MO, USA and completed a Senior Post-doctoral Fellowship in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Physiology at Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA, USA. He has authored numerous peer-reviewed publications, reviews, and grant applications related to epithelial barrier models and transporters.

HANNA, Imad, PhD

Biography

Dr. Imad Hanna is a Group leader in the Department of Drug Metabolism and Pharmacokinetics at Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in East Hanover, NJ. Dr. Hanna obtained his B.S. degree in Biochemistry from Oakland University in Rochester, MI. and his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from Wayne State University in Detroit, MI. Following a two-year postdoctoral fellowship at the Center in Molecular Toxicology at Vanderbilt University, Imad joined the Pharmaceutical industry in 2000. Currently, Imad’s group provides drug metabolism and transport support for the registration of clinical drug candidates. Imad is a member of a global team defining scientific/business strategies to assess potential drug interactions with respect to drug transporters. In this regard, he and his colleagues have implemented a number of cell-based drug transport assays in support of this strategy, as well as providing support to ongoing key projects.

HUISMAN, Maarten, PhD

Biography

Maarten was driven by ‘doing something useful for patients’ and studied Biology at the U Groningen, and obtained his PhD in 2003 at the Netherlands Cancer Institute focusing mainly on the role of multidrug transporters on the (pre)clinical pharmacokinetics of multidrug transporters. He then worked as a post-doc in a small biotech company, HepArt (academic spin-off), aiming to develop a bio-artificial liver. In 2006 he joined Janssen Pharmaceutica in Belgium (Johnson & Johnson) as a study director of pre-clinical DMPK studies. In 2007 he became team leader of the In vitro DMPK lab team and the In vivo DMPK lab team (2010). From 2007 to December 2011 he led the Center of Expertise on Drug Transporters within J&J. Since January 2012 he was accepted in an internal 2-year program, called Bridges, to also gain experience in drug discovery and to keep bridging the Discovery and Development parts of the organization. In 2014, he continued in a role in Discovery Sciences.

JANSEN, Gerrit, PhD

Biography

Dr. Gerrit Jansen obtained his PhD degree in Biochemstry at the State University of Utrecht, The Netherlands in 1984. From 1985-1990 he held a post-doctoral position at the Utrecht University Medical Center (Dept. of Oncology). In 1991 he moved to the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam (Dept. of Medical Oncology). From 1992-1994 he was a recipients of a fellowship of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, which was followed by a senior postdoctoral position at the VU University Medical Center (Dept. of Medical Oncology). In 2001 he moved to the Department of Rheumatology (currently Amsterdam Rheumatology and immunology Center) at the VU University Medical Center to become head of the laboratory for experimental rheumatology. Dr. Jansen’s main research interest focuses on molecular mechanisms of drug resistance, with a special interest for resistance mechanisms to classical (e.g. antifolates) and experimental drugs from an anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer perspective.

JOHNSON, William W., Ph.D

Biography

Dr. William W. Johnson earned his Ph.D. degree in Biochemistry at the University of Maryland, USA, in 1994. He held a postdoctoral position at Vanderbilt University, USA, from 1994-1997 (INRSA, NIH, with F.P. Guengerich). He worked as a principal scientist at the Schering-Plough Research Institute, Lafayette, NJ, USA, from 1997-2003, which was followed by the position of Associate Director at OSI Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Boulder, CO, USA. In 2010 he continued his career as an Associate Director at GlaxoSmithKline, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA. He joined SOLVO Hungary in 2012 as Vice President, Director of Global Operations. Dr. Johnson’s main research interest concentrates on transporters, DM/PK, hepatotoxicity, bioactivation, metabolism, and drug interaction.

KEOGH, John, MSB, CBiol

Biography

John Keogh (MSB, CBiol; jpkeogh@virginmedia.com) is an independent DMPK consultant with JPK Consulting. His client base includes UCB Chiesi and Astellas. He has over 25 years drug development experience with Glaxo SmithKline (GSK), and whilst here was a key player in the development and application of transporter science expertise to facilitate drug discovery and development. He is an industry expert in membrane transporter science and strategies, is experienced in interpreting and contextualizing DMPK data to solve issues and challenges in drug development, and in refining strategies in this emerging scientific discipline. He has a wealth of specialist expertise in the evaluation of drug-drug interaction challenges, notably in the drug transporter field. John’s client services include training, practical advice on assay development and interpretation, and assistance in regulatory document preparation. John is a champion for excellence and education in the transporter field, publishing and lecturing regularly. He is an active member of a team currently working on a comprehensive volume of transporter sciences for publication in the RSC Drug Discovery Series in 2015.

KRAJCSI Péter, PhD

Biography

Dr. Peter Krajcsi has extensive experience in biotechnology. He received his PhD in biochemistry from University of Szeged and later a Doctor of Sciences degree in biological sciences from the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. In his academic career he has focused on three major topics (i) steroid receptors (ii) molecular biology of adenoviruses and (iii) apoptosis. For the past 13 years he has been working in R&D management positions for small and medium size enterprises in drug research and gene therapy in Hungary as well as in the United States. Since 2002 he is the Chief Scientific Officer of Solvo Biotechnology. At Solvo the focus is on membrane transporters and utilization of membrane transporter technology in drug discovery and development as well as in development of diagnostics tools for cancer and inflammatory diseases.

LANGER, Oliver, PhD

Biography

Oliver Langer was born in 1971 in Vienna, Austria. He studied pharmacy at the University of Vienna and graduated with a Master’s degree in 1995. He obtained his PhD degree at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden in 2000, where he specialized in the development of radiotracers for the imaging of neurotransmitter systems with positron emission tomography (PET). During his PhD studies he spent 3 years as a research fellow at the Service Hospitalier Frédéric Joliot (French Atomic Energy Commission, CEA) in Orsay, France. Since 2002 he has been employed at the Department of Clinical Pharmacology at the Medical University of Vienna (Austria), where he became Associate Professor (“Privatdozent”) in Radiopharmaceutical Chemistry in 2006. In 2010, he became Senior Scientist at Austrian Institute of Technology in Seibersdorf, which is Austria’s largest non-university research organization. In his research, he uses preclinical and clinical PET to address different questions related to drug disposition and pharmacodynamics.

MASEREEUW, Rosalinde, PhD

Biography

Roos Masereeuw (UU) received her PhD from Radboud University in Nijmegen in January 1997. This PhD program and a postdoc period were partly performed at National Institute for Environmental Sciences (NIEHS/NIH), Research Triangle Park, NC, USA. Dr. Masereeuw also visited the NIEHS/NIH institute Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory (ME, USA) as principal investigator in 1997, 1998, 2010 and 2014. In November 1996, she joined the Dept. of Pharmacology and Toxicology at Radboudumc as assistant professor and in July 2002, she was appointed as associate professor after obtaining an NWO-ASPASIA award. In 2009, she received the Dutch Pharmacological Society (NVF) Schering-Plough Pharmacology Award, in 2010 the Prix Galien Research Award and in 2015 she was elected Fellow of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists. Since July 2015 she is full professor of Experimental Pharmacology and since November 2018 director of research at Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences in The Netherlands. Research in the Masereeuw group is focused on developing novel therapeutic strategies to improve organ function in chronic disorders. Her group has developed unique human renal cell lines with a high predictive value for drug transport and metabolism. These cell lines are being used in the development of a bioartificial kidney, organotypic cultures for in vitro toxicity testing of chemical entities and drugs in development, and for studying the renal tubular secretion and reabsorption machinery. Roos Masereeuw has (co-)authored over 190 scientific papers, successfully supervised 20 PhD students and currently supervises 12 PhD students and 5 post-docs.

PASTOR-ANGLADA, Marçal, PhD

Biography

Marçal Pastor-Anglada is a Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Barcelona (UB). He is also the PI of the Molecular Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics group within the Oncology Program of the National Biomedical Research Institute of Liver and Gastrointestinal Diseases (CIBER EHD). He has hold positions as an INSERM researcher at the CNRS Centre de Recherches sur l’Endocrinologie Moléculaire et le Developpement and as a Research Associate at the Department of Cellular, Molecular and Developmental Biology at the University of California Santa Barbara. He has been Visiting Associate Professor at the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, Department of Oncology, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Visiting Professor at the Cellular and Molecular Physiology Laboratory at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. He is the author of more than 150 indexed articles, mostly devoted to the study of membrane transporters. His current interests deal with the pharmacogenetics and pharmacogenomics associated with nucleoside-derived drug based therapies. His laboratory also studies the biology and pharmacology of nucleoside transporter (NT) proteins, with a particular focus on the SLC28 gene family encoding CNT plasma membrane drug carriers. Besides the analysis of their pharmacological profiles, work on the regulatory properties of these genes/proteins is a major issue in the laboratory. Overall all his projects show a great emphasis on translational research.

SAHI, Jasminder, PhD

Biography

Jasminder Sahi obtained a Ph.D. degree in Pharmacognosy from Panjab University, India in 1991 and then participated in a post-doctoral program in the Department of Physiology and Biophysics, University of Illinois at Chicago, USA.  She has worked for four major pharmaceutical companies, starting her career in in the Department of Pharmacokinetics and Drug Metabolism at Parke Davis R&D, which was subsequently acquired by Pfizer Global Research and Development.  In 2012 she moved to Shanghai China from the USA, as Head of DMPK for GlaxoSmithKline R&D and in 2015 made the transition to Sanofi R&D, leading the DMPK, Toxicology and Animal Research efforts in the Asia Pacific region.   Jasminder’s research focus is on transporters and induction of drug metabolizing enzymes, using primary hepatocytes. While her initial forays into transporter research in academia involved ion transport to understand CFTR, at Pfizer she changed her focus to xenobiotic transporters, with the goal of improving drug disposition, delivery and safety.   She has worked extensively with hepatic and renal transporters as well as the blood-brain-barrier.  She is an elected member of the ISSX council, a reviewer for six journals and has authored over 40 peer-reviewed publications. 

SARKADI Balazs, PhD, MD

Biography

Balázs Sarkadi, MD, Ph.D., spent several years as a post-doc and then as a visiting scientist at major universities in the United States and Canada. He is research professor at Semmelweis University, member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, past president of FEBS, member of several international research societies including the Academia Europeae. His research has been focusing on membrane proteins, including the investigation of ABC membrane transporters, which play a major role in the multidrug resistance of cancer, in general pharmacology, and in stem cell function. His recent work is related to transporter regulation in cancer cells and stem cells. He has published more than 300 papers in international scientific journals, with a citation number over 13,400 (in WoS, or 18,500 in Google Scholar) and an h-index of 61 (GS 69). He has several international patents already in commercial applications.

SCHEER, Nico, PhD

Biography

Nico Scheer: Nico, Director and Head of the tADMET™ portfolio at the German Biotech company TaconicArtemis GmbH, a subsidiary of Taconic Farms Inc., received his PhD in Developmental Biology from the University of Cologne. Within Taconic he is responsible for a portfolio of translational mouse models and services for an improved in vivo analysis of the ADMET characteristics of new compounds. As part of this responsibility he is leading a program to generate new and innovative transgenic and tissue humanized mouse lines for the PK and safety profiling of drugs. Nico has published several papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals in the field.

TERASAKI Tetsuya, PhD

Biography

Dr. Tetsuya Terasaki graduated Kanazawa University in 1977 and received Ph.D. degree from University of Tokyo in 1982. He was appointed Full Professor of Tohoku University in 1996 and the University Distinguished Professor of Tohoku University in 2008. He received the Ebert Prize from American Pharmaceutical Association in 1985, the Meritorious Manuscript Award from American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists in 1996 and 2010, together with three Research Achievement Awards. In April 2013, he received the Medal of Honor with Purple Ribbon, bestowed by the Government of Japan to the most highly honored scientists. His major research interests are the molecular pharmacology of blood-brain barrier function and the pharmacoproteomics. He published extensively in journals, with 309 original research articles and 70 review articles and contributed chapters to over 50 books.

UNGELL, Anna-Lena, PhD

Biography

Biography: Anna-Lena Ungell received her PhD degree at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, in the area of comparative pharmacology. She has more than 25 years of experience from the Pharmaceutical Industry such as AstraZeneca in Sweden and UCB in Belgium. Anna-Lena has worked in various areas of DMPK such as drug absorption and disposition, metabolism, in vivo pharmacokinetics and models, reactive metabolites, prediction and assessments of DDI and as well as PK and PBPK modeling from early target to life cycle management. In AstraZeneca she has had managerial, scientific as well as DMPK project leader roles. Anna-Lena presently holds a position as Director and Head of Investigative ADME at UCB Pharma in Belgium. In her responsibilities lies being a manager for 25 scientists in Belgium and in UK, covering both in vitro and in vivo DMPK science delivering preclinical data in all ADME areas to projects in Neuroscience and Immunology for both chemical entities and biologicals. Anna-Lena Ungell has had numerous PhD students and Master Science students throughout her carrier and in year 2004 she received an Associate Professorship in Pharmaceutics at Uppsala University, Sweden. Anna-Lena have ca. 70 publications, both original articles and book chapters and numerous posters and oral communications

VAVRICKA, Stephan, MD

Biography

Dr Stephan Vavricka is the Head of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Stadtspital Triemli in Switzerland. His post doctorate positions held at University Hospital Zurich included Chief Resident and Research Fellow in Division of Gastroenterology, Resident in Division of Haematology, Internal Medicine. At University Hospital, Basel, he held the Chief Resident for Division of Gastroenterology. He also worked as a research fellow at The Martin Boyer Laboratories, University of Chicago, IBD Research Center(2002-2003) Dr Stephan Vavricka obtained awards for DDW poster of distinction in 2004, a ‘talk of distinction’ award at an investigator meeting as well as the IBD Jounior Prize of the SGGH in 2006. He works closely with the following research foundations Roche Research Foundation, Swiss National Science Foundation,Forschungskredit University of Zurich, Novartis Stiftung, Swiss National Science Foundation on projects relating to inflammatory bowel disease.