We are pleased to inform you that BioProNET has been granted a no-cost extension by the BBSRC to run until the end of August 2019. There is no additional funding associated with the extension, however we will have the opportunity to use the extension period to investigate, and put in place, mechanisms by which to sustain the network beyond August 2019.

We have already been in discussion with key stakeholders in industry and academia to ensure that the continuation of such a network is required, and in response had incredible support with regard to the need to ensure such an academic-industrial UK based network continues and thrives. As we develop our plans in the next 3-4 months for a sustainable network, we hope that all within the network will support the need for such a network and provide their input and ideas regarding the sustainability of the network. Please do contact us biopronet@biopronetuk.org if you have any thoughts or would like to be involved.

In addition to developing mechanisms for a sustainable BioProNET, we plan to hold the annual science meeting this year, potentially in late July, and a further meeting in October. We will have more firm plans in a few weeks, and will keep BioProNET members updated through newsletters, our website http://biopronetuk.org and Twitter (@BioProNETUK).

Additional focussed meetings, and those in collaboration with other organisations and the new phase II NIBB, are also being investigated. The BBSRC STARS programme, that BioProNET has helped deliver for the last 2 years, will also be running again in September 2019. We will also be continuing to collect outputs and impact of BioProNET activities.

We look forward to your continued support and seeing you at a BioProNET event soon.

October 10-11th 2018
British Medical Association House, Central London

Thank you to everyone who made this meeting a huge success. Photos will be shared with members once the photos are ready.

Wednesday October 10th
9.30 Registration
10.15-10.30 Welcome, achievements and what next for BioProNET
Designing more efficient cell-expression systems chaired by Mark Smales
10.30-10.55 Kerstin Otte University of Applied Science Biberach, Germany Identification and characterisation of intracellular production bottlenecks in CHO cells producing complex biopharmaceuticals
10.55-11.20 Colin Robinson University of Kent Development of next generation E. coli platforms for the regulated production and periplasmic targeting of biotherapeutics
11.20-11.45 Tarit Mukhopadhyay University College London Manufacturing the future at less than a $1 a dose and meeting global health needs
11.45-11.55 Andrew Peden University of Sheffield Developing a toolkit for determining the manufacturability of new therapeutics in CHO cells 
11.55-12.20 Nathan Lewis University of California San Diego, USA Engineering CHO cells with enhanced traits with multiplex genome editing

Building expression systems into optimised process chaired by Yvonne Genzel
13.25-13.50 Gary Finka GlaxoSmithKline Developing a next-generation cell line development platform through targeted automation, analytics and informatics
13.50-14.15 Sophia Hober Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden The human secretome project
14.15-14.25 Mayur Parekh Teesside University Improved preservation of biologics by continuous intensified lyophilisation
14.25-14.35 James Winterburn University of Manchester From bench to business with UKRI funding
14.35–15.00 Natalio Krasnogor Newcastle University Synthetic portabolomics: bridging the gap between the lab bench and industry to speed up the development of new biotech products

The clinic and beyond chaired by Laura Palomares
15.40-16.05 Caroline Barelle Elasmogen soloMERä Biologics: Site-specific therapeutic biologics for the treatment of inflammatory disease
16.05-16.20 Simon Saxby Leaf Expression Systems Plant produced biologics – process economics
16.20-16.30 Michael Plevin University of York Can an archaeal helicase enhance the performance of a nanopore DNA sequencer?
16.30-16.40 Pavlos Kotidis Imperial College London A mathematical model to describe CHO cell growth and monoclonal antibody glycosylation

18.00 Poster session
20.00 Conference dinner

Thursday October 11th
Upstream meets downstream – rapid process development chaired by Cleo Kontoravdi
9.00-9.25 Paul Dalby University College London Analysis and control of protein dynamics and stability: downstream to formulation
9.25-9.50 Yvonne Genzel Max Planck Institute for Dynamics of Complex Technical Systems, Germany Intensified cell-based viral vaccine processes: from continuous to perfusion and to hybrid systems
9.50-10.15 Maiken Kristiansen MedImmune Nucleic acid production for biotherapeutics
10.15-10.25 Dave Brockwell University of Leeds Investigating the effects of hydrodynamic force on the structure and biological integrity of a viral vector gene therapy product
10.25-10.35 Davide Vito University of Kent Translation engineering through the non-coding genome in CHO cells
10.35-11.00 Pernille Harris Technical University of Denmark Solution structure and self-association of pharmaceutical proteins

Molecular characterisation of process quality chaired by Alan Dickson
11.40-12.05 Mike Betenbaugh Johns Hopkins University, USA Glycoengineering of mammalian cell lines to improve product quality
12.05-12.30 Laura Palomares National Autonomous University of Mexico Challenges of bringing recombinant vaccines to the market: A case study for a influenza vaccine
12.30-12.40 Perdita Barran University of Manchester Top-down mass spectrometry methods for full characterisation of biopharmaceuticals
12.40-12.50 Rosa Morra University of Manchester Classical and non-classical secretion pathways in E. coli for periplasmic and extracellular recombinant protein production
12.50-13.15 Jonathan Bones The National Institute for Bioprocessing Research and Training, Ireland Characterisation of biopharmaceuticals using intact protein separations hyphenated to high resolution native mass spectrometry