Webinar: Cell Therapy Advances: From Benchtop to Bedside by LabX Media Group

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About This Webinar

Moving cell therapy discoveries from the laboratory bench to clinical trials requires numerous considerations. Proteins and reagents involved in cell therapy discovery must meet quality and safety guidelines—good manufacturing practices (GMP)—for human use. In this webinar brought to you by Bio-Techne, experts will discuss advances in cell therapy research and the challenges of translating basic research into clinical trials.

Topics to be covered

• Adult stem cells reverse osteoarthritis
• B cell activating factor (BAFF) CAR T therapy for B cell cancers

Presenters

Mitra Lavasani, PhD

Assistant Professor, Northwestern University, Research Scientist, Director of the Translational Cell Therapy Lab, Shirley Ryan AbilityLab

Lavasani obtained her bachelor’s degree in molecular biology and systems physiology in 1998 from San Jose State University. She earned her master’s degree in 2005 and PhD in 2008 in bioengineering from the University of Pittsburgh. She completed a postdoctoral fellowship in stem cell biology in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh, where she studied how progeria, an accelerated aging disease, affects human health and lifespan. From 2010 – 2015, she held research assistant professorships in both the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery and the McGowan Institute of Regenerative Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. In 2015, she joined the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab as a research scientist and Northwestern University’s Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation as an assistant professor. For the past 20 years, Lavasani has investigated the impact of adult stem cells on tissue regeneration after neuromusculoskeletal injuries and in age-related diseases. Lavasani’s ultimate goal is to translate her regenerative therapies to the clinic.

Reshmi Parameswaran, PhD

St. Baldricks Scholar, Assistant Professor, Division of Hematology/Oncology, Department of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University

Reshmi Parameswaran received her PhD in cell biology from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. She did her postdoctoral fellowship at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, where she explored the role of B cell-activating factor (BAFF) in pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and was the first to identify the expression of BAFF receptor in ALL cells. In 2016, Parameswaran joined Case Western Reserve University as a faculty member and is currently, an assistant professor in the Department of Hematology/Oncology. Her research group develops cell therapy methods for treating various hematological malignancies using CAR T and CAR natural killer cells. Recently, Parameswaran’s laboratory developed a ligand-based BAFF CAR T cell therapy for B cell cancers.