President's Message

ASGCT President's Message—May 2018

Dr. Helen E. Heslop - May 03, 2018

Join ASGCT President Dr. Helen Heslop for her final President's Message before the 21st Annual Meeting.

We have had a long pleasant spring in Houston this year, and now that May is here spring has also reached Chicago in time for the 21st Annual Meeting of ASGCT, which is now only two weeks away. Among the many events planned, I am delighted to welcome the invited keynote speakers to our four general sessions. This year, the Society is honoring Dr. Jean Bennett, who is receiving the Outstanding Achievement Award, and Drs. Luca Biasco and Luk Vandenberghe who are receiving the Outstanding New Investigator Awards. Each will be presenting a lecture highlighting their scientific achievements. Additionally, we are honoring Fondazione Telethon and its General Director Francesca Pasinelli, who will be accepting in person, with the Sonia Skarlatos Public Service Award. If you have not yet registered for the Annual Meeting, you can still do so online through May 10 or in person at the Chicago Hilton.

I am also looking forward to keynote lectures from Drs. Kathy High and Nick Restifo. Dr. High will deliver the George Stamatoyannopoulos lecture on Friday May 18th. Dr. High began her career studying the molecular basis of blood coagulation and the development of novel therapeutics for the treatment of bleeding disorders including gene therapy strategies. Her work on gene therapy for hemophilia led to a series of studies that characterized the human immune response to AAV vectors in a variety of target tissues and has now progressed to clinical translation of potential genetic therapies for multiple inherited disorders.

Dr. Nick Restifo will be delivering the Presidential Symposium on Thursday May 17th. Dr. Restifo’s research focuses on enhancing T cell-based immunotherapies and he has made broad contributions to the field of cancer immunity including identification of myeloid derived cell subsets that suppress anti-tumor T cell responses and discovery of a novel subset of long lived human T memory stem cells in humans.

I wish to thank you all for voting in the recent Board of Directors election. The Society has elected four new members to the Board of Directors, including a new incoming vice president. Each elected member will serve a three-year term, including the incoming vice president who will enter the leadership succession line. Stephen Russell, MD, PhD will serve a yearlong term as vice president before serving as ASGCT's president-elect and, finally, president through the 2021 annual meeting. I am pleased to welcome Richard Morgan, PhD as the Translational and Clinical Development Representative, Jennifer Adair, PhD and Stephen Hart, PhD as At-Large Directors. All four of the newly-elected members will begin their terms at the conclusion of 21st Annual Meeting.

I look forward to seeing you all in Chicago in two short weeks!

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