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November 16th marked the inaugural meeting of the newly formed Boston Epigenetics Society. With over 800 scientists in attendance to learn about the latest research from Dr. David Sinclair, Professor in the Department of Genetics, and co-Director of the Paul F. Glenn Center for Biology of Aging Research at Harvard Medical School, the society kick-off was extremely well attended making it a huge success.
Dr. Sinclair’s talk, entitled “Next-gen Epigenetics to Understand Why We Age”, focused on the role of epigenetics in aging. Spurred by cutting edge epigenetic tools including the newly released Dovetail® Pan Promoter Panel and Micro-C Assay, Dr. Sinclair shared with the audience advances in their understanding of the aging process and how this can be reversed through reprogramming of the epigenome.
The Boston Epigenetics Society is the brainchild of Dr. Bryan Vought, Director of In Vitro Biology at Ring Therapeutics and John McShane, Regional Sales Manager for the Boston area at Dovetail Genomics. With the greater Boston area being an epigenetic center of excellence, the pair has assembled a notable steering committee representing 12 organizations – Accent Therapeutics, Alkermes, Astellas, AstraZeneca, Beth Israel Deaconess, Broad Institute, Constellation Pharmaceuticals, Harvard University, Massachusetts General Hospital, Ring Therapeutics, Sanofi and University of Massachusetts Medical School – all from the immediate Boston area encompassing both academia and industry players. Dovetail Genomics is thrilled to be the primary sponsor and looks forward to supporting future events – both virtual and in person.
“The mission of Boston Epigenetics Society is to promote epigenetics and epitranscriptomics research.” stated Dr. Vought. “The newly formed society will focus on fostering greater interaction between both academic and industrial researchers, and established and up & coming scientists interested in epigenetics. While the society is focused on greater Boston area research community, we welcome anyone to attend our events.”
With the steering committee working to hold a meeting quarterly through 2022, the date for the next meeting has been set for January 25th with Dr. Robert Copeland, President, Co-founder and CSO of Accent Therapeutics anchoring the event. “In the spirit of fostering interactions and connections, we are looking to feature both a senior and junior speaker at our future meetings”, shared Dr. Vought. A second junior speaker is still to be identified.
How can you get more involved or find out more information about the Society? Open to all comers, a Boston Epigenetics Society LinkedIn group has been formed to enable interaction and discussion. Any interested speakers are encouraged to reach out to Dr. Vought and the steering committing directly. Should you have missed the inaugural event, a recording of the proceedings can be found here.
The huge success of the Boston Epigenetics Society now provides a blueprint to strengthen the local community and share new ideas related to epigenetics and the epigenome for other regions with a concentration of epigenetic research. With a keen interest in promoting and expanding epigenetics research, Dovetail Genomics is excited to work with other members of the epigenetics community who are interested in a similar model. Please reach out to us so we can we can start discussing how we might be able to better support you and your community.
