2015 Annual Meeting of the NIDA-funded National Center of Excellence for Computational Drug Abuse Research (CDAR)

Date:                                      Thursday, May 14^th, 2015

Scientific Programs:               8:00am-12:30 pm

Lunch & Poster Session:        12:30pm – 3:00pm

Location:                              the University Club, Ballroom A

3:00 – 5:00 pm      EAB Meetings

5:00 – 6:00 PM      EAB members, wrap up/write the report

We are delighted to invite you to attend our annual meeting of the NIH NIDA-funded National Center of Excellence for Computational Drug Abuse Research (CDAR), a joint Big-Data and computational initiative between the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) for accelerating Drug Abuse Research. The goal of the CDAR Center is to advance quantitative systems pharmacology and translational research in the area of drug abuse and addiction in collaboration with researchers/colleagues both in the Pittsburgh area and nationwide, including your laboratories. Our broader goal is to accelerate the design and development of novel pharmacological strategies for treatment of neurological diseases with the help of advanced computational and quantitative methods.

We sincerely hope that you will accept our invitation. This will help us present our progress and challenges (in the morning), and hear your comments and recommendations (in the afternoon). Please see a tentative program (summary) at the end of this letter.

The meeting will start with reports on the state-of-the-art technologies to be presented by the three PIs of the Center, leading the Computational Chemical Genomics (Xie), Computational Biology (Bahar) and Computational Genomics (Xing) cores of the Center. This will be followed by presentations by the leaders of Funded Research Projects (FRPs) currently supported by CDAR Center. The afternoon is reserved to poster session and EAB meetings. More detailed program will be communicated in April.

Tentative agenda:

May 14, 2015

7:30 – 8:00 AM Arrival & Poster Set-Up

7:45 – 8:20 AM    Breakfast

8:20 – 8:35 AM     Welcome by the Center Director and University/NIDA Administration

8:35 – 9:10 AM     Core A Research Report + Discussion: “Disease-Specific Chemogenomics Knowledgebases and TargetHunter© for Drug Abuse and Neurodisorder Research and System Pharmacology” by Dr. Xiang-Qun(Sean) Xie (Director/PI of CDAR and Core A leader), Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences/Drug Discovery Institute,Director of Computational Chemical Genomics Screening Center,Director of NIH NIDA Center of Excellence for Computational Drug Abuse Research,Associate Dean for Research Innovation, School of Pharmacy, University of Pittsburgh

9:10 – 9:45 AM     Core B Research Report + Discussion: “Insights into the Molecular Mechanisms of Functions of Neurotransmitter Transporters” by Dr. Ivet Bahar (PI of CDAR and Core B Leader), Distinguished Professor and John K. Vries Chair,Department of Computational & Systems Biology, School of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh

9:45 –10:20 AM     Core C Research Report + Discussion: “Genome-Phenome Association Analysis under Complex Structures” by Dr. Eric Xing (PI of CDAR and Core C Leader), Professor,Machine Learning Department & Language Technology Institute & Computer Science Department, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University, Director of Center for Machine Learning and Health

Coffee break (20 min)

10:40 – 11:00 AM  “Development of a CB2-selective Near Infrared Fluorescent Probe” by Dr. Mingfeng Bai, Assistant Professor, Department of Radiology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

11:00 – 11:20 AM   “Regulation of dopamine transporter function by classical and predicted ligands” by Dr. Ethan Block, Department of cell biology, University of Pittsburgh

11:20 – 11:40 AM   “Lifespan Perspective of Drug Addiction” by Dr. Ralph E. Tarter, Professor, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Pittsburgh

11:40 – 12:00 PM   “Development of Ligands for Memory-Based Treatments for Addiction” by Dr. Mary Torregrossa, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh

12:00 – 12:30 PM Training, dissemination, administration

12:30 – 1:30 PM      Lunch

12:30 – 3:00 PM     Poster Session

3:00 – 5:00 PM      Business Meetings

 3:00 – 4:00 PM      Meeting of EAB members only

4:00 – 5:00 PM      Meeting of EAB members with the CDAR Leadership

5:00 – 6:00 PM      EAB members only, wrap up/write the summary report

6:30 – 8:30 PM    Dinner (EAB members, CDAR & FRP Leaders, Pitt/CMU Admins)

May 15, 2015 – Breakfast and Departure

* FRP: Funded Research Project

** EAB: External Advisory Board