The Organising Committee has developed an exciting scientific program that includes high quality speakers and cutting edge science. The theme of the meeting is "The Rights of Medicines", with sub-themes of "The Right Drug, The Right Patient, The Right Dose and the Right Result" woven into each of the symposia. The diversity and quality of invited speakers is sure to provide excellent opportunites to increase knowledge and understanding of Pharmacology and Toxicology.

As part of ASCEPT's role of fostering debate about issues relating to Pharmacology and Toxicology in Australia we will be holding a debate on the topic of "Academics Don't Discover Drugs".

Free Communications have also been scheduled in the program and there will be posters sessions on the Monday and Tuesday with a Prize poster session on the Wednesday morning.

On the Sunday prior to the meeting we will be hosting a public lecture "Obesity - are drugs the answer?" and also a number of workshops.

Program Outline

Lecturers
- JPS
- Rand Anglo Australasian Visitor
- Rand Medallists

Symposia

Please click here for a printable version of the program

Program outline

Sunday November 29
10.00-12.00 Workshop: Careers
12.00-12.30 Tea break
12.30-13.30 Workshop: Student workshop on Statistics
13.30-14.30 Public Lecture: Obesity - are drugs the answer?
14.30-15.00 Afternoon tea
15.00-18.00 ADME/PK of Biopharmaceuticals and Natural Products
11.00-13.00 Teaching Connects Research and Professional Practise
18.00-19.00 Welcome reception

Monday November 30
8.25 - 8.30 Opening Ceremony
8.30 - 9.30 ASCEPT Plenary Lecturer
9.30 - 10.30 Japanese Pharmacological Society Lecturer (Professor Shuh Narumiya)
9.30 - 10.30 Rand Anglo Australasian Visitor (Professor Ann Daly)
10.30-11.00 Morning Tea
11.00-13.00 Size, Maturation and Body Composition
11.00-13.00 Drug Discovery for Diseases of the Brain
11.00-13.00 Free Communications
13.00-14.30 Lunch & posters
14.30-16.30 Individualising Medicines: Drug development for older people
14.30-16.30 Neuromodulatory Systems of the Gut as Drug Targets
14.30-16.30 Free Communications
16.30-17.00 Afternoon tea
17.00-18.30 Free Communications x 3
18.30-20.00 NHMRC Grant Forum

Tuesday December 1
8.30 - 10.30 Understanding Drug Drug interactions
8.30- 10.30 Protective actions of cGMP in Cardviovascular Disease
8.30- 10.30 Free Communications
10.30-11.00 Morning tea
11.00-13.00 Translation of Pharmacogenomics into Clinical Practice
11.00-13.00 Challenges and Opportunites for Academic Drug Discovery
11.00-13.00 Development/Debate Academics don't discover drugs
11.00-13.00 Free Communications
13.00-14.30 Lunch & posters
14.30-16.00 ASCEPT Oral Prize
16.00-16.30 Afternoon tea
16.30-18.30 Denis Wade Johnson and Johnson Young Investigator Symposium
19.00-22.00 ASCEPT Conference Dinner

Wednesday December 2
8.30- 10.30 Challenges and Opportunities for Functional Selectivity in Drug Discovery
8.30- 10.30 Cardiotoxicity of Presciption Drugs
8.30- 10.30 Free Communications
10.30-11.30 Morning Tea and Prize poster session
11.30-13.00 Rand Medallists (Professor Phil Beart and Professor Peter MacKenzie)
13.00-14.00 ASCEPT Annual General Meeting - awarding of Prizes/Lunch

Special Lecturers

Japanese Pharmacological Society Lecturer
Professor Shuh Narumiya
Shuh Narumiya is a Professor in the Department of Pharmacology, Kyoto University Faculty of Medicine, and, was the Dean of Medical School between 2004-2007.  He graduated from Kyoto University Faculty of Medicine in 1973.  After working as a physician in the University Hospital for two years, he studied biochemistry in the laboratory of Professor Osamu Hayaishi and obtained a Ph.D. in 1979.  He then worked as a post-doctoral fellow in the Wellcome Research Laboratories in England and studied pharmacology in the Prostaglandin Research group headed by late Sir John Vane and Salvador Moncada.  Dr. Narumiya returned to Kyoto in 1981, and worked first in the Department of Medical Chemistry and then in the Department of Pharmacology, and was promoted to a Professor in Pharmacology in 1992.

Dr. Narumiya has been carrying out his research in two areas.  One is the molecular biology and pharmacology of the prostanoid receptors.  His team cloned all the members of the family of the prostanoid receptors, and has been examining the role each member plays in mammalian physiology and pathophysiology.  The other area is the signal transduction and functions of the small GTPase Rho.  His team has contributed to development of this research area by discovering botulinum C3 exoenzyme, a molecular probe for Rho, in 1987, and thereafter, finding out Rho actions in cell adhesion, cytokinesis, G1-S progression and neurite extension, identifying a series of Rho effectors such as ROCK and mDia and characterizing their actions and introducing a ROCK-specific inhibitor, Y-27632.

Dr. Narumiya has been engaged in development of type/subtype-specific agonists and antagonists to the prostanoid receptors, and in development of ROCK inhibitors. The former is in collaboration with Ono Pharmaceuticals and the latter with the Mitsubishi Pharma.  In the former, his group by itself is carrying out the Early Phase 2 study of ONO-4819 in uncreative colitis patients.  In the latter, one of the Y-series compounds is planed to enter the Phase 2 trial as an anti-glaucoma agent.

He is a member of several academic societies including the Japanese Biochemical Society (JBS) and the Japanese Pharmacological Society (JPS), and has been members of many Government committees. He was the President of JBS for 2003-2004, and is currently the President of JPS.  He received many honors including the Gold Medal of the Giovanni Lorenzini Foundation (Italy), the Purple Ribbon, the Japan Academy Prize and the Imperial Prize, and the Ulysses Medal (UCD, Ireland).

Rand Anglo Australasian Visitor

Professor Ann Daly
Ann Daly is Professor of Pharmacogenetics at the Institute of Cellular Medicine, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University, UK. She received BA and PhD degrees in Biochemistry from the University of Dublin (Trinity College) and subsequently held post-doc positions at the Universities of Geneva and Newcastle. In 1989, she joined the newly-formed Pharmacogenetics group at Newcastle. Her research interests are on the pharmacogenetics of the human cytochromes P450 and drug transporters, genetic susceptibility to adverse drug reactions and the genetics of complex diseases. Current projects include (i) studies on the genetic basis of drug-induced liver injury with special reference to the role of immunogenetic factors and (ii) translation of pharmacogenetic findings on coumarin anticoagulants to the clinic including the use of near-patient testing.

Rand Medallists

Professor Phil Beart
Philip Beart completed his PhD at the Australian National University and subsequently worked at the Universities of Cambridge and Harvard before returning to Australia. He is currently a Senior Principal Research Fellow (NH&MRC) and has spent the last three decades pursuing diverse aspects of the neurochemical and molecular pharmacology of central transmitters. His major recent focus has been in understanding the neurobiology of L-glutamate by analysing the organization of its neurons, the pharmacology of glutamate receptors and transporters, and their involvement in excitotoxic brain injury. Phil has published over 200 research papers with more than 5,000 citations. He has been a visiting scientist in Paris, Cambridge, London, Bristol, Copenhagen and Montpellier, and received various awards including a DSc (1987), the Joliot Curie Visiting Professorship (Paris, 2004) and the Lawrie Austin Lectureship (Australian Neuroscience Society, 2009). Phil has served on numerous Editorial Boards, including a long association with the British Journal of Pharmacology. He has a strong commitment to the research ethos and training of young scientists, and is currently the Secretary of the International Society for Neurochemistry. Phil participated in the inaugural visit by Australian pharmacologists to China (1984), and has served on ASCEPT Council.

 

Professor Peter Mackenzie
Peter Mackenzie received his PhD from The University of Sydney in 1976. After postdoctoral training in the Physiology Department, Kuopio University, Finland, he was awarded a Fogarty International Fellowship to study at the National Institutes of Health, in Bethesda, USA in 1980, in the laboratory of Dr Daniel Nebert. He returned to Adelaide as a NHMRC Research Fellow in 1987 and is currently NHMRC Senior Principal Research Fellow and Professor in the Department of Clinical Pharmacology at Flinders University. His major research interest is the molecular biology of the UDP glycosyltransferases and their role in drug and chemical detoxification. He is currently the UDP Glycosyltransferase Specialist Advisor to the HUGO Gene Nomenclature Committee. Professor Mackenzie was elected ASCEPT visitor to the British Toxicological Society in 2000 and invited to deliver the 11th Dr Chiravat Sodavongvivad Memorial Lecture to the Thai Pharmacological Society in 2004. He was awarded the International Society for the Study of Xenobiotics Asia/Pacific Scientific Achievement Award in 2006 and was listed in the ISI 100-Most Cited Scientists in Pharmacology and Toxicology for 2007. Professor Mackenzie has served on the council and committees of many national and international professional societies, including ASCEPT, Microsomes and Drug Oxidations, and the International Society for the Study of Xenobiotics, and is on the editorial boards of six journals, including Molecular Pharmacology, Drug Metabolism and Disposition, and Drug Metabolism Reviews.

Symposia

ADME/PK of Biopharmaceuticals and Natural Products
(Russell Addison)

• Dr Bob Anderson (The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, AUS): Development of peptide vaccines for treatment of coeliac disease and other human immune diseases
• Dr Russell Addison (TetraQ, AUS): Challenges of pre-clinical development and bioanalysis of biopharmaceuticals and natural products
• Professor Basil Roufogalis (University of Sydney, AUS): A Herb-Drug Interaction Database - Australian Content, On-line and Clinical Recommendations
• Dr Amos Hedt (Patrys): Natural Antibodies as Therapuetics: Harnessing the Human Imune System to Fight Cancer
• Dr Anita Matthias (Integria Healthcare): Herbal R&D Challenges: Difficulties, assumptions and realities
• Dr Wayne Hooper (Q-Pharm): Human clinical trials of biopharmaceuticals and vaccines:Perils and pitfalls

Teaching Connects Research and Professional Practise
(Elizabeth Davis)

• Professor Andrew Somogyi (University of Adelaide, AUS)
• Dr John Duley (University of Queensland, AUS)
• A/Professor Les Sheffield (Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, AUS)

Careers Workshop
(Grant Drummond)

Size, Maturation and Body Composition
(Carl Kirkpatrick)

• A/Professor Nick Holford (University of Auckland, NZ): Allometric Scaling -- Theory and Experiment in Biology with Application to Human Physiology/Pharmacology
• Dr Bruce Green (University of Queensland, AUS): Body Composition -- Theory of Lean Body Weight Determinatin and its Application to Drug Dosing
• A/Professor Brian Anderson (Auckland Children's Hospital, NZ): Maturation -- Premature Neonates, Full Term Infants, Children, Adults. Descriptions of GFR and Drug Clearance from Very Young Babies to Young Adults
• Professor Evan Begg (University of Otago, NZ): Degeneration -- Is there Anything Left Associated with Older Age After Accounting for Differences in Size, Body Composition, Renal Function and Plasma Protein Binding?

Drug Discovery for Diseases of the Brain
(Michael Kassiou and Margaret Morris)

• Dr Annette Gross (GlaxoSmithKline, AUS): Ethnic and genetic determinants of drug response: Challenges and Opportunites in the Development of New Drugs for Diseases of the Brain
• DA/Professor Michael Kassiou (University of Sydney, AUS)
• Professor Richard Glennon (Virginia Commonwealth University, USA)

Individualising Medicines: Drug development for older people
(Sarah Hilmer) sponsored by the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Sydney

• A/Professor Sarah Hilmer (Royal North Shore Hospital, NSW): Pharmacovigilance in Drug Development for Older People
• Professor David Le Couteur (University of Sydney, AUS): The Aging Process as a Target for Drug Development
• Professor Andrew McLachlan (University of Sydney, AUS): Pharmacokinetic and Pharmacodynamic Studies in Older People
• Professor Richard Lindley (University of Sydney, AUS): Clinical Trials in Frail Older People

Neuromodulatory Systems of the Gut as Drug Targets
(Elizabeth Burcher)

• Professor David Grundy (University of Sheffield, UK): Gut afferents as targets for the treatment of visceral hypersensitivity
• Dr Helen Irving (Monash University, AUS): Multiple 5-HT receptors in the human colon: are they all potential targets?
• Dr Scott Smid (University of Adelaide, AUS): Endocannabinoids in the gut - a pot pourri of influence
• Dr Lu Liu (University of New South Wales, AUS): Interactions between tachykinins and prostaglandins in intestine, in health as well as disease
• Dr Paul Bertrand (University of New South Wales, AUS): Serotonin Reuptake in the GI Tract: How Does it Affect Serotonergic Signalling?

Understanding Drug Drug interactions
(John Miners)

• Dr Tom Polasek (Flinders University, AUS)
• Professor Evan Begg (University of Otago, NZ)
• Professor John Miners (Flinders University, AUS)

Protective actions of cGMP in Cardiovascular Disease
(Barbara Kemp)

• Dr Adrian Hobbs (University College London, UK)
• Dr Rebecca Ritchie (Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute, AUS)
• Dr Barbara Kemp-Harper (Monash University, AUS)

Cardiotoxicity of Prescription Drugs
(Philip Burcham)

• A/Professor Geoffrey Isbister (Calvar Mater Hospital, AUS): Drug-induced QT prolongation and TdP: How do we make a risk assessment in the individual patient?
• Professor Des Richardson (University of Sydney, AUS): Molecular Mechanisms of Anthracycline Induced Cardiotoxicity
• A/Professor Philip Burcham (University of Western Australia, AUS): Drug Toxicity and the Heart

Challenges and Opportunities for Academic Drug Discovery and Development
(Alastair Stewart)

• Dr Debbie Hay (University of Auckland, NZ): High-Throughput Technologies: Value Beyond Hit-Finding Applications
• A/Professor Peter Meikle (Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute, AUS) : Metabolomics in Drug Discovery: Present and Future Opportunities

Academics don't discover drugs (debate)

• For: Dr Maclolm Handel, Mr Daniel Grant, Professor Peter McIntyre
  
  
• Against: Dr Alan Robertson, Professor Graham Johnston, Professor Maree Smith

Challenges and Opportunities for Functional Selectivity in Drug Discovery
(Arthur Christopoulos)

• Professor David Nichols (Purdue University, USA): Functional Selectivity in the Design of Novel Psychotropic Drugs
• Professor Mike Waters (University of Queensland, AUS): The Structural Basis of Agonist-Directed Signalling in Growth Hormone Receptors
• Professor Arthur Christopoulos (Monash University, AUS): Engendering Stimulus-Bias in G Protein-Coupled Receptors; Challenges for Pharmacology and Drug Discovery
• A/Professor Tom Ratajczak (Western Australian Institute of Medical Research, AUS): Impact of Genetics on Functional Selectivity: Consequences of Naturally Occurring Mutations on Calcium Sensing Receptor Signalling and Disease

Translation of Pharmacogenomics into Clinical Practise
(John Duley)

• Professor Ann Daly (Newcastle University, UK)
• Professor Elizabeth Phillips (Centre for Clinical Pharmacology & Infectious Diseases, AUS): Overcoming the barriers of clinical translation: the abacavir example
• Dr John Duley (University of Queensland, AUS): Advances in Thiopurine Pharmacogenomics
• A/Professor Les Sheffield (Murdoch Childrens Research Institute, AUS): Use of pharmacogenomics testing for drug dosage adjustments
• Dr Benedetta Sallustio (Queen Elizabeth Hosptial, AUS): Renal Transplant Pharmacogenomic