Targeting Inflammation and Podocytopathy in Chronic Kidney Disease

Organizers

Carine Boustany, PhD, PharmD

Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceutical

Dr. Carine Boustany is a Director of External Innovation in Cardiometabolic Diseases Research at Boehringer Ingelheim. In this role, Carine is responsible for leading a team aimed at identifying new drug targets for the treatment of Chronic Kidney Disease. Prior to joining BI in 2011, Carine was a Research Project Leader at Pfizer where she was responsible for diabetes and diabetic nephropathy programs. Carine was also an Assistant Professor at the Lebanese International University (Beirut, Lebanon) and at the Holy Spirit University (Kaslik, Lebanon). Consistent with her experience spanning preclinical to clinical research, Carine's education includes a PharmD degree from Saint-Joseph University (Beirut, Lebanon), followed by a PhD in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the College of Pharmacy at the University of Kentucky (Lexington, Kentucky), and a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Kentucky focused on investigating the role of components of the renin-angiotensin system in the metabolic syndrome.

Scott MacDonnell, PhD

Regeneron Pharmaceuticals

Dr. Scott MacDonnell obtained his undergraduate and master's degrees in exercise physiology from the University of Delaware and completed his doctoral work in cardiovascular physiology at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. He completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Temple University Medical School in the lab of Dr. Steve Houser. His fellowship research focused on identifying mechanisms responsible for the pathogenesis of heart failure. Specifically, his work examined the role of CaMKII in altered contractility, myocytes apoptosis, and transcriptional regulation associated with heart failure progression. This work has been published in Circulation Research and recognized as a best manuscript by the editorial board in 2010. Additionally, Scott was recognized by the International Society for Heart Research and awarded the young investigator of the year in 2008. Scott worked for 8-years as a principal scientist at Boehringer Ingelheim within the department of CardioMetabolic Disease Research where his research focused on identifying novel therapeutic treatment options for chronic kidney disease, heart failure, and fibrosis. Scott currently works at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals in the department of Cardiovascular and Renal Disease where he leads an in-vitro group supporting both screening and functional assay development for heart failure, hypertension, pulmonary fibrosis and hypertension, and both acute and chronic renal indications.

Jay J. Kuo, PhD

Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceutical

Jay Kuo is a scientist in the Cardiometabolic Disease Department at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals. He received his PhD in Pharmacology from the University of Minnesota followed by post-doctoral research at the University of Mississippi Medical Center studying the cardiovascular, metabolic, and renal effects of the hypothalamic melanocortin system. Following his post-doctoral studies, he developed pre-clinical in vivo models to support small molecule therapeutic programs at Nitromed and at Surface Logix. He joined Boehringer Ingelheim in 2010 and is currently a laboratory head in the External Innovation group that is focused on the discovery and advancement of novel therapeutic concepts for the treatment of diabetic nephropathy.

Sonya Dougal, PhD

The New York Academy of Sciences

Caitlin McOmish, PhD

The New York Academy of Sciences

Speakers

Hans-Joachim Anders, MD

University of Munich

H.J. Anders received his training in nephrology and rheumatology at the University of Munich in Germany and now directs the Department of Nephrology at the inner city campus. He runs a lupus nephritis clinic and also his experimental research is focussed on the molecular and cellular mechanisms of glomerulonephritis and kidney remodelling. His group makes efforts to accelerate translational research in immune-mediated kidney disease for a better understanding of disease pathophysiology and better treatment options.

John Cijiang He, MD, PhD

Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Dr. John Cijiang He got his MD at Shanghai Second medical University and PhD in Physiology at University of Paris VII, France. He was a visiting scientist at NIH in Maryland and The Picower Institute for Medical Research in New York. He completed his medical residency at SUNY down state and clinical nephrology fellowship at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Currently, he is a tenured full Professor of Medicine and Pharmacology/Systems Therapeutics at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. He holds the title of Irene and Dr. Arthur Fishberg endowed chair of Nephrology. He is the division chief of Nephrology at Mount Sinai Health System. He is currently the president of Chinese American Society of Nephrology. His major research areas include podocyte biology and pathology, signaling networks in kidney cells, systems biology of kidney disease, and kidney fibrosis. His major clinical interest includes diabetic kidney disease, viral-induced kidney disease, and primary glomerular disease. He is the member for NIH and VA study section. He has been well-funded by NIH and VA. He has published more than 150 peer-reviewed papers in the high impact journals.

Steven Kerr, MS

Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals

Steven Kerr is a Sr. Scientist in the Cardiometabolic Disease Department at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals. He received his BS degree in biology from the University of Michigan and his MS degree in biochemistry from Wayne State University. His research background includes developing therapies for cardiovascular diseases such hypertension, heart failure, and atherosclerosis, as well as the role of inflammation in the pathology of chronic kidney disease. Steven is a lab head centering his research on the development of new in vivo models of chronic kidney disease with an emphasis on cardiovascular involvement. His group is responsible for the development and testing of new therapeutic agents for the treatment of diseases associated with nephropathy and cardiovascular injury.

Matthias Kretzler, MD

University of Michigan

Matthias Kretzler, MD is a Professor of Internal Medicine/Nephrology and Computational Medicine and Bioinformatics. He is PI of the Multidisciplinary research team in diabetic endorgan damage at U Michigan, the U54 Nephrotic Syndrome Research Network (NEPTUNE) in the Rare Disease Clinical Research Network II, Director of the Applied Systems Biology Core in the O'Brien Renal Center at UMichigan. He has 18 years of experience in integration of bioinformatics, molecular and clinical approaches in more than 200 collaborative studies. He and his team focus is on interdisciplinary data integration of large-scale data sets generated in prospective cohort studies of CKD across species, tissues and diseases. Using systems biology approaches he and his team defines regulatory networks activated in human glomerular diseases. This approach has allowed the identification and validation of molecular prognostic biomarkers of chronic kidney disease and successful developments of molecularly targeted therapies in glomerular disease in public-private partnerships.

Kevin V. Lemley, MD, PhD

University of Southern California

Dr. Lemley is Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine and Attending Nephrologist at Children's Hospital Los Angeles. His MD and PhD (Physiology) degrees are from Stanford University, where he was also on the faculty for 8 years. He has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the American Diabetes Assocation and other national funding agencies. He was a Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Germany). He is a member of the American Pediatric Society. He is an advisor to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the NIH. He has a thirty-year history of research on the biology and pathobiology of the podocyte and in structural studies on the kidney in humans and experimental animals. His main research interests are podocyte cell biology and pathobiology, stems cells in therapy of kidney disease, morphometric studies of kidney disease and mathematical modeling. His main clinical interests are diabetic kidney disease, glomerular disease, nephrotic syndrome and genetic diseases of the kidneys.

Jochen Reiser, MD, PhD

Rush University Medical Center

Jochen Reiser, MD, PhD is the chairman of the Department of Medicine at Rush University Medical Center and the Ralph C. Brown, MD professor of Medicine at Rush University. Dr. Reiser is a world-renowned research leader in the field of kidney disease with a heavy focus on molecular biology and genetics. He has published more than 145 papers, many of them in highest impact journals. His contributions range from identification of the first circulating factor known to start the process leading to focal segmental glomerulosclerosis as well as to general mechanisms of chronic kidney disease. His work started new research fields and significantly advanced new treatment options for this disease. Dr. Reiser directs a NIH-funded research laboratory in renal disease and biomedical investigation. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), the American Clinical and Climatological Society (ACCA) and the Association of American Physicians (AAP). Dr. Reiser earned his medical degree and PhD (summa cum laude) at the Ruprecht Karls University of Heidelberg, Germany and served his residency in internal medicine at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York. He completed his fellowship in nephrology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital at Harvard Medical School in Boston. He then was an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and the founding director of the program in glomerular disease at the Massachusetts General Hospital. Prior to arriving at Rush in September of 2012, Dr. Reiser was a professor of medicine, anatomy and cell biology, vice chairman for research in the department of medicine, and chief of the division of nephrology and hypertension at University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine. There, he also served as the Interim Chairman of Medicine. With his appointment to Rush, Dr. Reiser became the youngest chairperson of internal medicine at an academic medical center in the United States. Since his tenure at Rush, the department has grown by more than 100 members to a size of 500 faculty and his improvements largely impacted on the financial and academic growth of the entire Rush system.

Myung Shin, PhD

Merck & Co. Inc.

Myung Shin received his BA from Northwestern University and PhD from University of California-Berkeley. He was a Jane Coffin Childs Postdoc Fellow at Princeton University and Associate Member at Fox Chase Cancer Center prior to joining Merck. For about a decade, he led efforts to identify novel technologies for making Genetically Engineered Models for all therapeutic and functional areas across Merck. More recently, he became the Genetics Lead within the GpGx Department to identify and validate novel human genetics targets within the cardio-metabolic diseases area.

Katalin Susztak, MD, PhD

University of Pennsylvania

Dr. Katalin Susztak is a physician-scientist at the University of Pennsylvania. Her laboratory is interested in understanding the pathomechanism of chronic kidney disease development. Her laboratory uses next generation sequencing methods and a large collection of human kidney tissue samples to identify novel pathways and biomarkers. At present there are more than 1,400 kidney tissue samples in her Biobank. The samples are carefully annotated with functional (eGFR, albuminuria) and structural (glomerulosclerosis and tubulointerstitial fibrosis) parameters. RNAsequencing analysis has been completed for more than 600 microdissected glomerular and tubular samples. These discovery approaches are complemented with careful cell and molecular biological studies to define the role of individual genes and pathways. This analysis identified a concerted dysregulation of immune system, metabolic and developmental genes (Niranjan et al. Nature Medicine 2008, Kang et al Nature Medicine 2015). While transcript level differences can highlight important changes in human CKD, we believe that integrating these results with genetic and epigenomic studies will be essential to identify causal pathways for CKD development. As such her laboratory has been part of the NIH Roadmap Epigenomics Projects to characterize the epigenome of healthy and diseased kidneys. Dr. Susztak has been the recipient of the 2011 Young Investigator Award of the American Society of Nephrology and American Heart Association; one of the most prestigious award given to researchers under the age of 41 in the field of nephrology. Her laboratory is supported by the National Institute of Health, the American Diabetes Association, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and private sources.

Ashlee N. Ford Versypt, PhD

Oklahoma State University

Professor Ashlee N. Ford Versypt holds three degrees in chemical engineering: a BS from the University of Oklahoma and an MS and a PhD from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. As an undergraduate student, Professor Ford Versypt was named the Outstanding Chemical Engineer Senior in the University of Oklahoma College of Engineering and graduated summa cum laude. During graduate school, Professor Ford Versypt was awarded the Department of Energy Computational Science Graduate Fellowship and the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Professor Ford Versypt spent a summer as a graduate research intern in the Computational Science Center at Brookhaven National Laboratory. In 2013, Professor Ford Versypt was recognized as the Frederick A. Howes Scholar in Computational Science, which is awarded annually to a recent alumnus of the DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship for outstanding leadership, character, and technical achievement. In 2012–2014, Professor Ford Versypt was a postdoctoral research associate with Professor Richard Braatz in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Currently, Professor Ford Versypt is an assistant professor in the School of Chemical Engineering at Oklahoma State University. She also holds an appointment in the Harold Hamm Diabetes Center at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.

Roger C. Wiggins, MB, BChir

University of Michigan

Roger C. Wiggins was raised in Zimbabwe in Africa, received undergraduate and graduate training at Cambridge University in England and London Teaching Hospitals, and research training at Scripps Clinic and Research Foundation in La Jolla, California. He was recruited to the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor in 1981 where he served as Director of the Nephrology Training Program for 10 years, Division Chief of Nephrology for 15 years, and Director of the NIH-supported O'Brien Kidney Center for 23 years. His long-standing research focus has been podocyte biology and defining the role of podocyte depletion in progression of glomerular diseases ("The podocyte depletion hypothesis"). A recent focus has been on how podocyte parameters can be harnessed to monitor and manage prevention of glomerular disease progression in the clinic ("podometrics"). He has received various awards including the John P. Peters Award from the American Society of Nephrology in 2015.