Webinar
Title: “Chemical biology platforms to drug the undruggable”
By Brandon Turunen
Organized by the Medicinal Chemistry Section
Thursday –May 19, 2022
4.00 pm
Register for the May Webinar meeting at:
https://american-chemical-society.zoom.com/webinar/register/WN_UhK9-dkdSzuB24NxazjWcg
Biography: Dr. Brandon Turunen completed PhD studies with Gunda I. Georg at the University of Kansas before completing NIH post-doctoral studies at Stanford University in the laboratory of Barry M. Trost. In 2007, He joined GSK (RTP, NC) and has held roles in oncology and chemical biology programs as a medicinal chemist, medchem leader, and program leader. In 2013, he transferred to London, UK to join the CEO’s Future Strategy Group to develop a corporate strategy for improving access to GSK medicines. He then relocated to Collegeville, PA to lead the Synthetic Immunology Discovery Performance Unit which focused on the development of a new heterobivalent therapeutic platform applied toward immuno-oncology. In 2018 his role expanded, and he is currently the US Head of Chemical Biology leading a multidisciplinary department focused on translating immunology, oncology, and human genetic insights into medicines.
Abstract: There are 20,000 human proteins, however only a small percentage have been targeted by traditional drug discovery programs. Toward understanding the tractability of the “dark proteome” GSK has implemented the use of platform technologies including ASMS, ELT and Reactive Fragments to create an experimental tractability platform. The presentation will discuss how we are using this approach to Identify tractable, high quality, biological targets.
