Keynote Speakers

Rima Al-awar, Director Dr. Al-awar earned a PhD in synthetic organic chemistry from North Carolina State University working on Lycopodium Alkaloids and did a post-doctoral fellowship focused on natural products synthesis at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill prior to joining Eli Lilly and Company in 1995. While at Lilly, she was an active medicinal chemist in the oncology area working in multidisciplinary teams on the antimicrotubule agent Cryptophycin and later on several kinase focused efforts. In 2002, while at Lilly, Dr. Al-awar took on administrative responsibilities as Head in Discovery Chemistry Research and Technologies and later as Head, Route Selection, in Chemical Product Research and Development prior to joining the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research as Director of the Drug Discovery Program in July 2008.
Steve Rees, Vice President Steve Rees is currently Vice-President of Screening Sciences and Sample Management at AstraZeneca with global responsibility for High Throughput Screening, Compound Management, the human tissue BioBank and the provision of SAR biology support to preclinical discovery projects. Prior to joining AstraZeneca, Steve worked at GlaxoSmithKline for 24 years in various roles including that of Director of the Screening and Compound Profiling Department at GlaxoSmithKline in Stevenage. Steve has been responsible for developing hit identification, compound profiling and compound management strategies for AstraZenenca and previously GlaxoSmithKline. Steve has led multiple international collaborations and has sponsored the development and implementation of a range of cellular assay technologies for ion channel, GPCR and other target classes. Steve has authored >60 scientific papers and has spoken at many international symposia including three occasions at the Society of Laboratory Automation and Screening (SLAS). He is currently Chair of the SLAS Europe Council . He is a member of the BBSRC panel of experts and is a member of the Board of Directors of ELRIG.