The Indiana Clinical and Translational Sciences Institute (CTSI) held its second campus retreat of 2022 on Wednesday, March 30. The event was hosted by the University of Notre Dame and the theme was, “Modern Approaches to Drug Discovery.”
“The event was very impressive with great presentations by participants from the each of the major Indiana sites, as well as an external speaker and corporate participation,” said Paul Helquist, PhD, who is one of the Indiana CTSI navigators for the University of Notre Dame. “During the keynote presentation, Shaomeng Wang did a fantastic job breaking down the scientific sequence of all his areas of focus.”
Shaomeng Wang, PhD, the Warner-Lambert/Parke-Davis Professor in Medicine at University of Michigan Medical School, was the keynote speaker. Wang’s main area of focus is structure-based design and synthesis of molecular target-specific small molecule drugs for treating cancer and neurological diseases. During his presentation, Wang spoke about developing and applying new computational and informatics methods for drug design and discovery.
“Drug discovery research is a team science, and we need to cover it for a long time in order to have success in drug cell research collaboration in multi-disciplines,” said Wang, who is also a professor of medicine, pharmacology and medicinal chemistry.
The retreat was held virtually over Zoom and many people joined from around the state of Indiana.
“Virtual events facilitate participation from the more remote locations of the Indiana CTSI’s network,” stated Helquist, who is also a professor of chemistry. “Perhaps a hybrid format could be considered in the future to meet both goals of broad participation and in-person networking.”
The event also featured panel discussions about expediting drug discovery through automation and computation, modulators of proteostasis pathways and protein folding.
Watch video from the retreat here: 2022 Indiana CTSI Retreat hosted by the University of Notre Dame | Events | News & Events | Health and Well-being Initiative | University of Notre Dame
