Webinar Description:

Despite significant advances have been made in developing novel therapeutics for cancer treatment, only about five percent of new cancer drugs are approved, and most fail due to lack of translation from preclinical results to clinical efficacy. The current preclinical methods including animal models are limited in predicting successful clinical outcomes. The development and application of humanized animal models, which mimic human immunity and therapeutic targets, may provide promising solution to the challenges of preclinical translation. The outline of this webinar includes:

• Overview of current animal models in immunotherapy
• The translatability limitations of current animal models
• Improve the translation with humanized animal models

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the limitation of current animal models in immunotherapy
• Understand why a humanized model is needed
• Understand the application of humanized animal models

Speaker:

Zhaoxue (Luke) Yu, PhD
Global Head of Preclinical Pharmacology
Biocytogen Boston Corp

Dr. Yu has more than 15 years of research and technical leadership experience in drug discovery and model design for immune/autoimmune rare genetic diseases, neurological diseases, tumors and metabolic diseases across various therapeutic modalities including antibodies, biologics, small molecules, mRNAs, and AAVs. Prior to Biocytogen, Dr. Yu served as a pharmacology technical leader at Gemini Pharmaceuticals, Achillion Pharmaceuticals, and Alexion Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Yu has been a major contributor to multiple drug development programs from preclinical to clinical stages, some of which have subsequently obtained success approvals by the FDA.

Dr. Yu received his Ph.D. in Neurobiology and M.D. in China. He has held postdoctoral research positions at institutions including Emory University, Yale University, and Boston Children’s Hospital. Dr. Yu is an established author of multiple publications in peer-reviewed journals and patents, in addition to being a speaker at several international conferences and seminars.