Abstract:
Development of neutralizing antibodies, is a crippling concern in the management of patients undergoing administration of protein therapeutics as evidenced in replacement therapy and other treatment procedures. Several issues in the genesis and modulation of such deleterious immune responses have been studied. While authors have focused on the downstream events of the specific immune response and suggested modification of protein therapeutics to eliminate epitopes that interact with B cell receptors, T cell receptors, or MHCII molecules, the mechanisms underlying Ag interaction with APCs, a step upstream of immune effectors, have been grossly neglected. We wish to emphasize that the recent knowledge in understanding the capacities of an APC to handle an Ag and the importance of the surrounding microenvironment in this process are crucial for designing novel protein therapeutics with reduced immunogenicity.
This talk would highlight the increasing interest in understanding the role of critical cells in immune response – viz. the Dendritic Cells and Macrophages.
The scope of this knowledge is not limited to issues concerning immunogenicity.
Antigen presenting cells are essentially "cellular sinks" for an administered therapeutic. They have profound role(s) in catabolism of the therapeutic protein.
This talk will thus try to delineate the delicate balance between half-life of a therapeutic protein and its inherent immunogenicity from the standpoint of these cells.
This type of knowledge might be essential in designing novel protein therapeutic in the future.

Brief Biography of the Speaker:
I am a researcher in Biomedicine. My broad interest is in how cellular immunology and biochemistry can be integrated to understand therapeutic approaches in a better way. I graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay, Mumbai, India with a PhD in Biosciences and Bioengineering. I did postdoctoral research in UMRS 872 Equipe 16, INSERM, PARIS, France, wherein I focussed to understand the genesis of immune response against therapeutic factor VIII in hemophilia A patients with various model systems. I co-authored several peer-reviewed research articles and review articles in reputed international journals. I presented my work in several international conferences on Immunology, Hematology and Glycobiology. My work formed the basis of various projects in our laboratory and resulted in two patents.
I was a member of the European Macrophage and Dendritic cell Society (EMDS) and have been invited to review research and review articles from several journals viz. Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology & Therapeutics and Clinical Risk Management. I have won Young investigator travel award from several international societies and companies which include EMDS, International Congress of Immunology and Tebu-Bio and Novo-Nordisk. Currently I have shifted to Boston where I am working as an instructor at Channing Laboratory, Department of Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA. I am working on understanding how components of commensal microflora can induce immunomodulation.