MARCH 19, 2021, NEW YORK – Ludwig Cancer Research invites all to attend the latest event in its ongoing celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research: the Ludwig-Oxford symposium on Cancer Early Detection and Epigenetics. Co-hosted with the Cancer Research UK Oxford Centre and the Oxford Centre for Early Cancer Detection, and free to attendees, the symposium will bring together international leaders in cancer epigenetics and early detection April 28th-29th, 2021, to discuss recent advances in both fields and generate new ideas for future research.
Epigenetics is the study of chemical modifications made to DNA and its protein scaffolding that regulate the expression of the genome. New technologies have significantly increased the scale and speed at which epigenetic marks can be accurately identified, mapped and linked to biological phenomena. These new capabilities have been of considerable value to the study of cancer, in which epigenetic modifications are frequently disordered, contributing to the aberrant gene expression that drives tumor growth and drug resistance.
In parallel with these developments, the rapid advancement of technologies to identify and sequence relatively rare fragments of DNA shed by tumors into blood and other body fluids have fueled a race to devise minimally invasive diagnostics for early cancer detection and patient monitoring. The latest epigenetic sequencing technologies promise to add significant value to the information obtained from such “liquid biopsies,” and the convergence of the two fields has exciting implications for cancer care. Ludwig has made important contributions to the development and clinical translation of both technologies.
Sessions at the Ludwig-Oxford symposium will cover Early Detection Technologies, Risk Stratification for Early Cancer Detection, Chromatin and Cancer, and Nucleic Acid Modifications and Cancer. The symposium will run from approximately 15:00-19:00 (UK time)/10:00-14:00 (U.S. EST) each day.
Confirmed speakers include:
- Naomi Allen (University of Oxford)
- Eleanor Barnes (University of Oxford)
- Stephen B. Baylin (Ludwig Cancer Research, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine)
- Shelley Berger (University of Pennsylvania)
- Sangeeta Bhatia (Ludwig Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
- Chuan He (Ludwig Cancer Research, University of Chicago)
- Nada Jabado (McGill University)
- Cigall Kadoch (Ludwig Cancer Research, Dana Farber Cancer Institute)
- Kenneth W. Kinzler (Ludwig Cancer Research, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine)
- Tony Kouzarides (University of Cambridge)
- Nickolas Papadopoulos (Ludwig Cancer Research, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine)
- Gillian Reeves (University of Oxford)
- Jens Rittscher (Ludwig Cancer Research, University of Oxford)
- Yang Shi (Ludwig Cancer Research, University of Oxford)
- Chunxiao Song (Ludwig Cancer Research, University of Oxford)
Please register for the event here.
Click here to access the symposium brochure, which includes the agenda, as well as abstracts and bios for the speakers.
If you have any questions about the event, please direct them to conference@ludwig.ox.ac.uk.