Jan Lötvall's Biography

Jan Lötvall, Professor, University of Gothenburg; Founding President of ISEV; Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Extracellular Vesicles

Jan Lötvall is Professor at the Institute of Medicine at Göteborg University since 2002 where he directs a research laboratory studying extracellular vesicles. He is a medical specialist in both Clinical Allergy and Clinical Pharmacology, and has a long-term experience in translational studies in primarily inflammation, but also cancer. He was first elected President of the International Society for Extracellular Vesicles (ISEV, 2011-2016), a rapidly growing non-profit organisation in the field of exosomes, microvesicles and other extracellular vesicles (www.isev.org; >1100 members). The research line focusing on extracellular vesicle biology has received extensive international recognition, as the lab was first to discover the ability of exosomes to shuttle RNA between cells in 2007. During the period of May 2016 to January 2018, JL served as Chief Scientist at Codiak BioSciences, a startup biotech company focusing on developing exosomes as a therapeutic platform. From January 2018, JL was the founding editor of the journals “Clinical and Translational Allergy” (2011, IF 3.239) and Journal of Extracellular Vesicles (JEV: IF 14.9). JL is the current Editor-in-Chief of JEV since August 2019. He is also the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Scientific Officer of Exocure Biosciences, a privately held vesicle therapeutics company.

Clinical Translation of Extracellular Vesicle Research

Tuesday, 18 February 2020 at 12:30

Add to Calendar ▼2020-02-18 12:30:002020-02-18 13:30:00Europe/LondonClinical Translation of Extracellular Vesicle ResearchEV-based Diagnostics, Delivery and Therapeutics in Coronado Island, CaliforniaCoronado Island, CaliforniaSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com

Over the last ten to fifteen years, we have seen a massive increase in the understanding of extracellular vesicle (EV) biology and function, primarily based on in vitro models and animal experimentation. Currently, there is a strong push to translate EV science to the clinic, primarily as diagnostic and therapeutic tools. For diagnostics, tests are becoming available primarily for the diagnosis of different types of cancer, and initially RNA or DNA in the vesicles have been used to phenotype and stage disease. However, a significant number of EV-membrane proteins are starting to identify subpopulations of EVs, and these are putative biomarker candidates in different diseases. In this lecture, I will describe a work process to identify EV subpopulations of different human cell- or tissue origin, and present how they can function as biomarkers. Perhaps even more important is the current investments in developing EVs as therapeutics in different diseases. Several venture capital financed startup biotech companies have been established to develop EV therapeutics in diseases such as cancer or rare diseases such as Neiman-Pick type C. Most EV startups focus on delivering different types of cargo to a recipient cell’s cytoplasm, for example a large protein or an siRNA molecule that otherwise would not be taken up in a recipient cell. I will discuss the different therapeutic opportunities with EVs, and present some of our own efforts in developing highly efficient EV-mimetics directly from cell membranes at very high yields. I predict that in the next few years, EV therapeutics will become a clearly established modality as the next generation of biological medicines, and we are likely to see medical revolution evolving before our eyes.

Add to Calendar ▼2020-02-17 00:00:002020-02-18 00:00:00Europe/LondonEV-based Diagnostics, Delivery and TherapeuticsEV-based Diagnostics, Delivery and Therapeutics in Coronado Island, CaliforniaCoronado Island, CaliforniaSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com

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