Over 1500 life science professionals attended the Drug Discovery 2022 conference this year. Organised by ELRIG – leaders in the provision of scientific meetings and conferences – the conference provided the perfect platform for the community to come together to restart the life science revolution; with over 50 world-class speakers and plentiful networking opportunities. Through engaging presentations and innovative technologies presented by exhibitors, delegates had an immersive experience that provided them with an in-depth guide to the latest and most exciting trends in drug discovery. Here, we bring you some of the event’s many highlights.
Sharing Knowledge, Inspiring Action
ELRIG events are renowned for high-quality science. But this year, ELRIG partnered with the British Pharmacological Society (BPS), the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening (SLAS), and the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), to bring delegates an even broader mix of topics on all aspects of drug discovery research. For example, in her keynote presentation, Molly Stevens, Professor of Biomedical Materials and Regenerative Medicine at Imperial College London, explained how SPARTA® technology is enabling scientists to develop a portfolio of nanomedicines that interact with the biological environment to deliver a targeted biocargo. Meanwhile, Rab Prinjha, VP Head of the Immunology Research Unit at GlaxoSmithKline shared how advances in genomic sciences are improving target identification, providing deeper insight, faster. As target identification is a stumbling block for many therapeutic areas, the hope is that more researchers now share a vision for how these advances can be incorporated into other drug discovery pipelines.
Our newly crowned winner of the Early Career Professional Impact Award, Dr. Shaun Pennington, also gave a presentation on his research. The Award recognises and celebrates early career contributions that have made a clear impact on the wider scientific community. Dr Pennington is an immunologist/ microbiologist working in drug discovery at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine. and received the award for his efforts in developing various screening platforms to better understand and target SARS-CoV-2. The two-day event had a full programme, featuring eight-insight-packed tracks on subjects from High Content Imaging (HCI) to developments in preclinical models, and cell and gene therapies. Over 52 scientific speakers and 40 technology speakers shared expert insights, presented case studies and answered questions to share learnings that could help other scientists improve their drug discovery and development activities.
