Confirmed Speakers

Antoine Deslandes received his PhD in Experimental and Clinical Pharmacology from the Paris University. He worked in several companies (Servier, Parke-Davis, Pfizer) where he held positions in DMPK and Pharmacology and then joined a gene therapy company. Then at Sanofi, he initially supported clinical PK/PD for Oncology projects and is now global Scientific Advisor for Biotherapeutics Drug Disposition.

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John Gilmer completed his PhD in molecular recognition in 1995. He moved into commercial pharmaceutical R&D and from there in 1998 to lectureship position in the School of Pharmacy in Trinity College Dublin. His main research interests are drug targeting through covalent modification and bile acid medicinal chemistry. JG is founder of Solvotrin Therapeutics which is developing new prodrug and related delivery technologies.

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Currently, Norbert Lange is a faculty member at the School of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of Geneva. Following his PhD in Physical Chemistry obtained from the University of Göttingen (Germany) in 1995, he became interested in the use of light for the diagnosis and treatment of diseases and joined Hubert van den Bergh’s group in Lausanne. There, he was implicated in the synthesis, clinical testing, and development of 5-ALA derivatives. Some of these compounds are now approved for clinical use in Europe and the US. Since then, Norbert Lange has extended his research into many fields of biophotonics. The focus of his research group is devoted in the development of new concepts in photodynamic therapy, new in vivo and in vitro models, formulation of drugs, the use of nanoparticle technologies in PDT and fluorescence diagnosis, as well as molecular imaging in a clinical context.

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Jean-Christophe Leroux received his degree in pharmacy from the University of Montreal, followed by a Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences (1995) from the University of Geneva (Switzerland). From 1996 to 1997 he completed a postdoctoral training at the University of California, San Francisco and then joined the University of Montreal as an assistant professor. He was promoted to the ranks of associate professor in 2002 and full professor in 2007. Prof. Leroux joined the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at ETH Zurich as ordinary professor at the end of 2008. His research interests include the design of novel biopolymers and drug delivery systems. Recently, he has been involved in the development of new polymer therapeutics for Celiac disease and in the evaluation of colloidal antidotes for the treatment of drug overdose. He has (co)authored more than 150 refereed articles, 13 book chapters and 15 patents/patent applications. He is associate editor of the Journal of Controlled Release, and serves in the editorial board of 4 other scientific journals.

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Florence Lhospice is Director Pharmaceutical Operations, Innate Pharma. Florence Lhospice, pharm D joined Innate Pharma in 2002. She completed pharmacy study at University of Joseph Fourier (France) and University of Montreal. She started working on small molecule targeting T Lymphocyte in the CMC field. In 2008 she moved into monoclonal antibody development ; She became responsible for the CMC development (Quality and viral safety part) of an IgG4 targeting KIR2DL3 antigen. The antibody has been out-licensed to Bristol Myers Squibb in 2011 (in phase I), Florence was responsible for the data and known-how transfer to BMS team. Since 2012, merging small molecule and monoclonal antibody universe, Florence have been leading the ADC program focusing on new site specific conjugation technology.

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María J. Vicent is the Head of the Polymer Therapeutics at Príncipe Felipe Research Center. After a PhD in material sciences between Castellón (Spain, Luis’ Lab.) and U.C. Berkeley (USA, Frechet’s Lab.), a Marie Curie funded postdoc in Prof. Duncan’s Lab. (Cardiff, UK) and one-year research associate position through a Marie Curie Reintegration contract at CIPF (Valencia, Spain); she was appointed as principal investigator in June 2006 to build the first Polymer Therapeutics Lab. in Spain. She has published more than 60 papers and book’s chapters, 2 editorials and she is a named inventor in 6 patents 2 of them already licensed to the pharmaceutical industry. Furthermore, in 2012, she co-founded a Spin-Off company named ‘Polypeptide Therapeutic Solutions SL’ based on a family patent from her own group. María was awarded with the ‘Idea Award’ from ‘Fundación de las Artes y las Ciencias’ for its ‘Polymer-based combination therapy’ approach in June 2008. She is the President of the Spanish-Portuguese Chapter of the Controlled Release Society and is chairing the Polymer Therapeutics Symposium: from Lab to Clinic, one of the most recognized conferences in the field.

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