Overview
The RNA Therapeutics Symposium, the first such event in Singapore, will showcase some of the ongoing work in Singapore on various classes of RNA therapies, RNA chemistries and delivery of therapeutic payload.
We invite you to the 1st RNA Therapeutics workshop to be held in Singapore, co-organized by the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) and the Institute of Molecular & Cell Biology (IMCB), ASTAR. The recent approval of RNA-therapeutics for several diseases has invigorated the interest in the field. The goal of the symposium is to showcase some of the ongoing excellent work in Singapore, on various classes of RNA therapies, RNA chemistries and delivery of therapeutic payload. This inaugural symposium features Dr Manoharan Muthiah, Senior Vice President of Alnylym Pharmaceuticals, one of the largest global RNA Therapeutics leaders, as the keynote speaker. Along with him, we will have seven Singapore-based scientists from GIS, IMCB, NCCS, NTU, NUS, and Cargene, a local start-up, presenting their technologies. This event is supported by SGInnovate, and will be a platform for academic and pharma/start-up-based researchers to network, along with investors following the developments in the RNA therapeutics field.
Date: 15 Feb 2023
Time: 8:30am - 1:00pm (UTC+8)
Venue: 30 Biopolis Street, S(138671), Level 2, Theatrette 2, Matrix Building
Registration closes on 8 Feb, 11:59pm (SGT/UTC + 8)
Programme:
08:30 - Welcome Address - Prof Kanaga Sabapathy, National Cancer Centre Singapore
08:40 - Living in the World of RNA Therapeutics - Dr Muthiah Manoharan, Senior Vice President, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals USA
09:30 - Design and Functional Evaluation of Mutation-specific siRNAs - Prof Kanaga Sabapathy, National Cancer Centre Singapore
09:55 - Discovery to Drug of an siRNA Preclinical Candidate - Dr Yann Chong Tan, Cargene Therapeutics
10:20 - Structure-Enhanced Antisense (SEA) Oligos - Prof Phan Anh Tuan, Nanyang Technological University
10:45 - Tea Break
11:15 - Next-gen ASO Potency and Platform for Quantifying functional Delivery of NATs - Dr Dave Keng Boon Wee, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology
11:40 - Micellar Nanocomplexes for Synergistic Drug Delivery - Prof Jackie Y. Ying, Institute of Materials Research and Engineering
12:05 - AAV-CRISPR-Cas13 Eliminates RNA Virus in Infected Mice - Dr Chew Wei Leong, Genome Institute of Singapore
12:30 - Design and Delivery of Functional RNA for Suicide and Mitochondrial Gene Therapy - Asst Prof Volker Patzel, National University of Singapore
12:55 - Closing Remarks - Dr Dave Keng Boon Wee, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology
Keynote Speaker:
Muthiah Manoharan, PhD, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Dr Muthiah (Mano) Manoharan serves as the Senior Vice President of Drug Innovation, a Scientific Advisory Board Member, and a Distinguished Research Scientist at Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Cambridge, Massachusetts. In 2003, he was the founding chemist hired at Alnylam as the Head of the Drug Discovery. He and his team pioneered the discovery and development of numerous chemical modifications, GalNAc conjugation chemistry, and LNP delivery platform that make RNA interference-based human therapeutics possible. This work led to the approval of five RNAi therapeutics: ONPATTRO® (patisiran, 2018), GIVLAARI® (givosiran, 2019), OXLUMO® (lumasiran, 2020), LEQVIO® (inclisiran, 2020, 2021) and AMVUTTRO® (vutrisiran, 2022).
Dr Manoharan has had a distinguished career as a world-leading chemist in the field of oligonucleotide therapeutics. He is an author of more than 235 publications (nearly 59,300 Google Scholar citations with an h-index of 111 and an i10-index of 422) and over 500 abstracts, as well as an inventor of over 250 issued U.S. patents.
Dr Manoharan is the winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Oligonucleotide Therapeutics Society (2019), the M. L. Wolfrom Award (2007), D. Horton Industrial Carbohydrate Chemistry Award (2021) from the Carbohydrate Chemistry Division of the American Chemical Society and the Chemical Research Society of India (CRSI) 2022 Medal by the Council of the Chemical Research Society of India. He was elected as a Fellow of the American Chemical Society in 2022.
Dr Manoharan was born in Madurai, Tamil Nadu, India and received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in chemistry at the American College, Madurai, India. He earned his Ph.D. in chemistry at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and learned the field of oligonucleotides at Yale University as a post-doctoral research associate.
Speakers:
Prof Kanaga Sabapathy, National Cancer Centre Singapore
Dr Dave Keng Boon Wee, Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology
Asst Prof Volker Patzel, National University of Singapore
Dr Chew Wei Leong, Genome Institute of Singapore
Dr Yann Chong Tan, Cargene Therapeutics
Prof Phan Anh Tuan, Nanyang Technological University
Prof Jackie Y. Ying, Institute of Materials Research and Engineering
Organised by:
