The scientists presenting in the December webinar will be Dr Etienne Caron, Assistant Professor at Yale University, and Dr Nicholas Polizzi, Assistant Professor at Harvard University.
Date: 05-12-2025
Time: 1:00-2:00 pm
Venue: an online Zoom seminar
Dr Etienne Caron, Assistant Professor at Yale School of Medicine
Title: Immunopeptidomics: unveiling the peptides that regulate immune responses
The human immunopeptidome represents the collection of all peptides presented to the immune system. It plays a critical role in controlling cancer, autoimmunity, and infectious diseases. The Caron Lab develops and applies mass spectrometry technologies to explore the composition and dynamics of the human immunopeptidome, with the goal of transforming vaccine design and immunotherapy.
Dr Nicholas Polizzi, Assistant Professor at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School
Title: Zero-shot design of drug-binding proteins using neural networks
The use of deep neural networks has improved almost every aspect of protein structure prediction and design. Yet, the design of proteins that bind to small molecules has remained an outstanding challenge. Here, I will discuss new models and algorithms that unlock the use of neural networks for design of drug-binding proteins from scratch with unprecedented success rates. This work enables the design of binders in a single shot, which we demonstrate with the design of an exatecan-binding protein for applications in targeted delivery.
Date: 05-12-2025
Time: 1:00-2:00 pm
Venue: an online Zoom seminar
Dr Etienne Caron, Assistant Professor at Yale School of Medicine
Title: Immunopeptidomics: unveiling the peptides that regulate immune responses
The human immunopeptidome represents the collection of all peptides presented to the immune system. It plays a critical role in controlling cancer, autoimmunity, and infectious diseases. The Caron Lab develops and applies mass spectrometry technologies to explore the composition and dynamics of the human immunopeptidome, with the goal of transforming vaccine design and immunotherapy.
Dr Nicholas Polizzi, Assistant Professor at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School
Title: Zero-shot design of drug-binding proteins using neural networks
The use of deep neural networks has improved almost every aspect of protein structure prediction and design. Yet, the design of proteins that bind to small molecules has remained an outstanding challenge. Here, I will discuss new models and algorithms that unlock the use of neural networks for design of drug-binding proteins from scratch with unprecedented success rates. This work enables the design of binders in a single shot, which we demonstrate with the design of an exatecan-binding protein for applications in targeted delivery.