Although the concept of epigenetics dates back to the mid-18th century, interest in the field of epigenome and disease pathogenesis has been a quickly expanding area of research during the last few decades. Epigenetics is the study of changes in gene expression without any alterations in primary DNA sequence, and encompasses topics including DNA methylation, histone modification and non-coding RNAs. Aberrant gene expression patterns are known to contribute to the pathogenesis of various diseases, including cancer, inflammation, cardiovascular and neurodegenerative diseases, and even metabolic disorders. Pharmaceutical companies such as AstraZeneca, Epizyme and Oryzon Genomics are investing billions of dollars for the development of therapeutics for cancer, asthma, Alzheimer’s, etc., and the FDA has recently approved a few promising cancer therapeutics (e.g., vorinostat and ruxolitinib) that were developed by targeting epigenetic mechanisms.

The ASPET Young Scientists Committee invites you to attend “Epigenetics in Drug Discovery”. The symposium will be held during the ASPET Annual Meeting at Experimental Biology 2018 in San Diego, CA on Sunday, April 22, 2018 from 3:30 pm - 6:00 pm, San Diego Convention Center, Room #15B. The main purpose of this symposium is to introduce and update scientists about the progress made in the field of epigenetics and its potential in the context of translational research. The speaker list comprises established scientists in the field of epigenetic drug discovery, who are speaking on topics including: epigenetics in cancer and beyond, microRNA epigenetics, and exosome mediated communication in pain. We will have two abstract based speakers along with five invited speakers Patrick Woster from the Medical University of South Carolina, Sharad Verma from Johns Hopkins, Aai-Ming Yu from UC Davis, Nate Hathaway from UNC, Seena Ajit from Drexel University and Gwen Lomberk from the Medical College of Wisconsin. This symposium is ideal not only for those working in epigenetics and drug discovery, but for anyone who is interested in learning about this new dimension of drug discovery research. We are excited to bring you this great symposium and hope to see you there. Should you have any questions, please contact the symposium co-chairs, Venkat Vaka (vvaka@umc.edu) and Joe Jilek (jljilek@ucdavis.edu).