International Drug Discovery and Thermo Scientific Present a Free Webcast on Cells.
Date: Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Time: 10:00 AM EST
Embryonic stem cells (ES) provide a valuable tool for both drug discovery and cell replacement therapies. One can use ES cells to generate large numbers of specific cell types needed to carry out screening campaigns for drug discovery and to understand basic biology of diseased states. This ability to generate enough relevant material is critical when studying certain diseases such as neurodegenerative disorders, where the traditional source material is typically primary tissue from animals. For instance, obtaining large numbers of ALS affected motor neurons for screening campaigns can be hindered by access to enough material. The differentiation of ES cells into motor neurons, however, has shown great promise as a viable method to alleviate this roadblock and provide access to the cultures required. Researchers are now able to take this one step further by generating disease specific cell types from human origin through reprogramming of somatic cells into induced pluripotent cells (iPS). Generating multiple iPS cell lines from patients can aid in profiling lead compounds in the drug discovery process. Currently, a major difficulty in the field is the availability of uniform methods and reagents for growing, expanding, differentiating, and characterizing these cells. Thermo Fisher Scientific now provides researchers with the ability to streamline these processes by providing the necessary reagents. With this optimized approach, researchers can obtain the reagents needed to grow, expand, differentiate, and characterize cell cultures with a high degree of confidence.
Speakers:
Amy Sinor-Anderson
Amy Sinor is a Senior Research Scientist at Thermo Fisher Scientific, in the Life Sciences Research - Cellomics division, focusing on developing products for stem cell research. Prior to joining, Thermo Fisher Scientific, she was a Scientist at Curis Inc and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute. At Curis, she conducted small molecule screens in embryonic stem cell derived motor neurons to identify possible candidates to promote motor neuron survival using high content analysis. At Harvard Stem Cell Institute, she continued her work from Curis to identify small molecule candidates that promoted the upregulation of a particular protein that was decreased during embryonic development.
Amy s scientific interest has primarily focused on Neuroscience/Stem Cell research. Her initial research focused on studying the pharmacology of glutamate transporters in glial cultures and understanding the effects of ischemia/hypoxia on neuronal cultures and the mechanisms for protection. During her graduate work at the University of Pittsburgh, she studied the role of Akt, a serine-theronine kinase on the regulation of telencephalic progenitors/stem cells.
Amy earned a Ph.D. in Neurobiology from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and received her B.A. in Biology and Chemistry from SkidmoreCollege.
Paul D. Andrews, Ph.D.
Drug Discovery Unit, Div. of Biological Chemistry and Drug Discovery
College of Life Sciences
University of Dundee
Paul obtained a B.Sc (Hons.) in Biochemistry at the University of Sheffield and a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology in David Hornby's laboratory, also in Sheffield, characterizing human DNA Methyltransferase. After a short postdoc in translational infertility research he moved to Mike Stark's laboratory in the Biochemistry Dept. at the University of Dundee, Scotland, to pursue an interest in signal transduction and the cell cycle. Using budding yeast as a classical model system he elucidated some of the myriad functions of type-1 protein phosphatase. Next he took up a senior post-doctoral position in the laboratory of Jason Swedlow, running the DeltaVision Microscope facility and established a system for live cell imaging of Aurora B protein kinase going on to identify the mitotic microtuble depolymerizing kinesin, MCAK, as a key substrate and effector of Aurora B - proposing a new model for the regulation of chormosome biorientation. In 2007 he was recruited to lead the Stem Cell Technology Programme in the Drug Discovery Unit within the College of Life Sciences at Dundee. In this position Paul established the high-content screening capabilities for the Unit and the team has performed more than six successful high-content screens using human embryonic stem cells. His current interest lie in targeting signaling pathways using small molecules in order to manipulate stem cell fate, improve cellular reprogramming an in targeting cancer stem cells.
Moderator:
Nathan Collins
Editor, Russell Publishing
SOURCE: International Drug Discovery
