The Kenneth Rainin Foundation Announces 2013 Innovations Symposium - Stress Responses, Inflammation And Disease

OAKLAND, Calif., Nov. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Kenneth Rainin Foundation announced today its next Innovations Symposium, which will be held on Friday, July 12, 2013 at The Four Seasons Hotel Chicago. This unique one-day symposium will bring together preeminent investigators from a variety of disciplines to present their cutting-edge research on the molecular and cellular aspects of inflammatory and stress response pathways presented in the context of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD). The Symposium will provide a think-tank environment to describe and explore recent advances in these diverse areas of research. The goal of the Symposium is to promote out-of-the-box thinking and foster breakthroughs in our understanding of disease mechanisms and identify novel IBD therapeutic targets. 

Using IBD as a lens, senior leaders in each discipline will discuss their work, with ample time dedicated to audience participation to draw connections across these distinct but related disciplines and set new directions for the future.

Guest speakers include:

• Vishva Dixit, M.D. – Genentech, Inc.
• Gokhan S. Hotamisligil, M.D., Ph.D. – Harvard School of Public Health
• Richard I. Morimoto, Ph.D. – Northwestern University
• Hiroshi Ohno, M.D., Ph.D. – RIKEN, Japan
• M. Celeste Simon, Ph.D. – University of Pennsylvania
• Herbert W. Virgin IV, M.D., Ph.D. – Washington University, St. Louis

About the Symposium
IBD, ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease, are chronic inflammatory disorders, which lead to long-term and sometimes irreversible impairment of the gastrointestinal tract.

Although the etiology of IBD has not been completely defined, significant progress has been made recently in understanding the pathogenesis of these diseases. It is now apparent that IBD develops, at least in part, as a result of a failure to maintain normal host-microbial interactions and mucosal immune homeostasis in a genetically susceptible individual. It is also increasingly clear that many environmental factors can contribute to the development and pathogenesis of IBD, including nutrition, stress, life style and the composition of intestinal microbiota. 

This deeper understanding of the genetic and immunologic factors of IBD has uncovered defects in shared fundamental biological pathways that are associated with cellular functions involving autophagy, microbial sensing, endoplasmic reticulum stress, and epithelial cell function. Therefore, the study of IBD should not be restricted to any particular field of biology or medicine. Making sense of this problem, scientifically and clinically, requires a combined effort of investigators from broad fields of biology such as genetics, cellular biology, microbiology and mucosal immunology. Too often, however, investigators working in these diverse fields are intellectually isolated from the scientists and physicians who study and treat IBD, or any other chronic disease for that matter. That is why we are bringing together the finest minds from a variety of disciplines to present their cutting edge research on inflammatory and stress response pathways.

The goal of the Kenneth Rainin Foundation Innovations Symposium is to encourage new pathways of scientific dialogue that will expand our horizons, promote the development of new ideas and insights, and foster collaborations to speed innovations in our knowledge and in patient care for IBD and other chronic diseases. By bringing together noted experts in fields with diverse insights, we believe that this unique Symposium will have a powerful and lasting impact on all participants and the research and patient care in which we are all invested. 

Registration

For more detailed information and to register for this event, please visit www.rainin-symposium.com. Early registration is recommended as seating is limited to 150.

Early Registration:     $125.00 – on or before March 31, 2013
Standard Registration:  $200.00 – after March 31, 2013
Student Registration:    $100.00 – graduate students and research fellows

About the Foundation

The Kenneth Rainin Foundation (www.KRFoundation.org) is a private family foundation that funds inspiring and world-changing work. We are dedicated to supporting effective early childhood literacy programs, enabling inspiration through the arts and creating opportunities for novel approaches and alternative treatment options for those with chronic disease.

The Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) members are Averil Ma, M.D., Chair of the SAB and Kenneth Rainin Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Director, Colitis and Crohn's Disease Center, UCSF; Yasmine Belkaid, Ph.D., Chief, Mucosal Immunology Section, LPD, National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Disease, NIH; B. Brett Finlay, Ph.D., Professor, Michael Smith Laboratories, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Microbiology and Immunology, The University of British Columbia; Claudio Fiocchi, M.D., The Clifford and Jane Anthony Chair for Digestive Disease Research and Education, Department of Pathobiology, Lerner Research Institute at Cleveland Clinic; Ruslan Medzhitov, Ph.D., David W. Wallace Professor of Immunobiology, Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Yale University School of Medicine. 

SOURCE The Kenneth Rainin Foundation