PROGRAMME
Wednesday, 24th September 2025 Lansdowne Suite, Herbert Park Hotel
Wednesday, 24thSeptember 2025, Lansdowne Suite, Herbert Park Hotel
Registration from 08:30 TBC: RCPI external CPD credits
09:00 – 09:15 Welcome and Introduction – Prof John Crown, St. Vincent’s Hospital, Dublin
EXTRA-TUMORAL BIOMARKERS AND THERAPEUTIC TARGETS
Session Chair – Prof. Sara Hurvitz, Fred Hutch Cancer Center
09:15 – 09:45 Circulating tumor DNA: Cutting-edge technology meets clinical reality
Dr. Heather Parsons, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
09:45 – 10:15 Developing epigenetic based combinatorial therapies for breast cancer
Dr. Karen Cichowski, Harvard Medical School
10:15 – 10:45 Understanding and overcoming disseminated tumor cell immune evasion
Dr. Cyrus Ghajar, Fred Hutch Cancer Center
10:45 – 11:00 Coffee break
TARGETED THERAPIES I
Session Chair – Prof. Sara Hurvitz, Fred Hutch Cancer Center
11:00 – 11:30 Expanding the horizons of PROTACs in oncology: From proof-of-concept with vepdegestrant to emerging targets
Eric Masson, SVP, Experimental Medicine & Development Sciences, Arvinas
11:30 – 12:00 The next generation CDK-4 inhibitor Atirmociclib: from preclinical to clinical
Dr. Libero Santarpia, Senior Medical Director, Late Stage Development, Pfizer.
12:00 – 12:30 HER-targeting TKIs in breast cancer
Dr. Denis Collins, Dublin City University
12:30 – 13:30 Lunch
ADVANCES IN ANTIBODY DRUG CONJUGATES
Session Chair – Prof. John Crown, St Vincent’s Hospital; DCU; UCD
13:30 – 14:00 Cadherin 17- a novel target for antibody drug conjugates in colorectal cancer
Dr. Neil O’Brien, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA
14:00 – 14:30 Therapeutic potential of TORL-4-500, an antibody-drug conjugate directed against delta like non-canonical notch ligand 1 (DLK1)
Dr. Martina McDermott, David Geffen School of Medicine, UCLA
KEYNOTE PRESENTATION
14:30 – 15:15 Topic TBC
Dr. Dennis J. Slamon, 2019 Lasker Award Winner, Director of Clinical/Translational Research, Director of the Revlon/UCLA Women’s Cancer Research Program at JCCC. Professor of Medicine, Chief, Division of Hematology/Oncology.
15:15 – 15:30 Coffee break
UPDATES FROM THE CLINIC
Session Chair – Dr. Dimitrios Tryfonopoulos, Saint Savvas Anticancer Hospital, Athens
15:30 – 16:00 Targeting KRAS in pancreaticobiliary cancers: understanding genotype immunophenotype interactions
Dr. Grainne O’Kane, Pat Smullen Chair in Pancreatic Cancer, University College Dublin
16:00 – 16:30 Neoadjuvant immunotherapy for lung cancer and mesothelioma: improving survival and expanding horizons
Dr. Patrick Forde, Trinity St. James’ Cancer Institute, Dublin
16:30-17:00 Long term impact of immunotherapy on early-stage cancers: IO toxicity and beyond
Dr. Jarushka Naidoo, Beaumont Hospital & Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.
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Thursday, 25th September 2025 Lansdowne Suite, Herbert Park Hotel
Registration from 08:30 TBC: RCPI external CPD credits
TARGETED THERAPIES II
Session Chair – Prof. Mark Pegram, Stanford University School of Medicine
09:00 – 09:30 Sensitivity and resistance to anti-HER2 antibody drug conjugates
Dr. Sarat Chandarlapaty, Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program, Memorial Sloan Kettering
09:30 – 10:00 Molecular evolution in metastatic breast cancer: A real world experience
Dr. Timothy Crook, Consultant Medical Oncologist, Cromwell Hospital, London
10:00 – 10:30 Exploiting cell cycle vulnerabilities: CID078, a novel cyclin A/B inhibitor
Dr. Lisa Kopp, Sr. Medical Director, Circle Pharma
10:30 – 10: 45 Coffee break
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND PATHOLOGY
Session Chair – Prof. Mark Pegram, Stanford University School of Medicine
10:45 – 11:15 AI in oncology pathology: from precision grading to prognostic prediction across cancer types
Dr Donal O’Shea, CEO, Deciphex
11.15 – 11:45 Radiomics Artificial Intelligence
Dr Haruka Itakura, Stanford University School of Medicine
11.45 – 12:15 AI models in histopathology: The current landscape
Prof. Hamid Tizhoosh, Department of Artificial Intelligence and Informatics, Mayo Clinic
12:15 – 13:15 Lunch
WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM SPATIAL PROFILING OF TUMOUR TISSUES
Session Chair – Prof. Lajos Pusztai, Yale School of Medicine
13:15 – 13:45 Spatial predictors of response to neoadjuvant IO therapy-
Dr. Raza Ali, Cancer Research UK, Cambridge Institute
13:45 – 14:15 Single cell sequencing landscape of breast cancer
Dr. Isaac Chan, Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Centre, University of Texas Southwestern
14:15 – 14:45 Topic: TBC
Dr. Jan Witowski, CEO and Co-Founder, Ataraxis
14:45 – 15:00 Coffee break
KEYNOTE PRESENTATION
15:00 – 15:45 Mixed molecular subtypes in ER-heterogeneously positive breast cancer
Dr Pusztai, Professor of Medicine at Yale University, Scientific Co-Director of the Center for Breast Cancer at Yale Cancer Center and Co-Leader of the Yale Cancer Center Genomics Genetics and Epigenetics Program.Mixed molecular subtypes in ER-heterogeneously positive breast cancer
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AIDED DRUG DEVELOPMENT
Session Chair – Prof. Lajos Pusztai, Yale School of Medicine
15:45 – 16:15 AI tools to accelerate drug development
Dr.Melissa Davis, Head of Computational Biology,Isomorphic labs
16:15 – 16:45 Deep learning for drug discovery: Accelerating innovation from data to molecules
Atomwise _________________________________________________________________________________________
Friday 26th September 2025 Lansdowne Suite, Herbert Park Hotel
Registration from 8:30 TBC: RCPI external CPD credits
TUMOUR MICROENVIRONMENT I
Session Chair – Prof Robert Kerbel, University of Toronto
09:00 – 09:30 Topic:
Dr. Kairbaan Hodivala Dilke, Queen Mary University of London
09:30 – 10:00 Best practices in immunocompetent preclinical cancer models – and why they still matter
Dr. Kabir Khan, Sunnybrook Research Institute, University of Toronto
10:00 – 10:30 Targeting neuroendocrine tumors: Triggering cell death and blocking DNA repair
Dr. Iacovos Michael, Sunnybrook Research Institute, University of Toronto.
10:30 – 10:45 Coffee break
TUMOUR MICROENVIRONMENT II
Session Chair – Prof Robert Kerbel, University of Toronto
10:45– 11:15 Bispecific antibodies targeting PD-(L)1 & VEGF-A
Dr. Claudia-Nanette Gann, Global Medical Lead, BionTech
11:15 – 11:45 PD1 blockade triggers DKK1 in CD8+ T cells: A driver of variable responses in brain metastasis
Prof. Yuval Shaked, Director of the Rappaport-Technion Integrated Cancer Center
11:45 – 12:15 On the road to a cancer ECM atlas: mapping the tumour matrix using in situ decellularisation
Dr. Alejandro E Mayorca-Guiliani, Senior Scientist, Nordic Bioscience
KEYNOTE PRESENTATION
12:15 – 13:00 From Immunotherapy to Antiangiogenic Therapy and Back: A 50 Year Journey with Many Ups and Downs, Twists and Turns (but Ending with a Big Ironic Up)
Dr. Robert Kerbel, Senior scientist, Biological Sciences, Odette Cancer Research Program, Sunnybrook Research Institute; Professor, Medical Biophysics, University of Toronto; Canada Research Chair in Tumour Biology, Angiogenesis and Antiangiogenic Therapy, Tier 1 (2001–2015)
13:00 – 14:00 Lunch
IO THERAPIES I
Session Chair: Prof. William Gallagher, University College Dublin & AICRI
14:00 – 14:30 Tebentafusp, a TCR-CD3 T cell engager, reshapes the tumour microenvironment to enhance anti-tumour T cell activity
Adel Benlahrec, Director, Translational Medicine, Immunocore
14:30 – 15:00 Topic: TBC
Raymond P. Goodrich,CSO, VP R&D, PhotonPharma, Inc.
15:00 – 15:30 Antibody-based therapeutics as I/O
Dr. Mark Pegram, Professor of Medical Oncology, Stanford University School of Medicine.
15:30– 15:45 Coffee break
IO THERAPIES II
Session Chair: Prof. John Crown, St Vincent’s Hospital; DCU; UCD
15:45 – 16:15 Enhancing DNA repair and innate immunity, a novel approach to cancer chemoprevention and treatment
Dr. Ken O’Byrne, Queensland University of Technology; Princess Alexandra Hospital
16:15 – 16:45 Topic: TBC
Dr. Giuseppe Gullo, Executive Medical Director, Clinical Development, Replimune.
Meeting ends
