20th anniversary celebration of the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University
Event description
- Health and wellness
- Open to the public
- Science
This year marks 20 years of scientific discovery at the Biodesign Institute at Arizona State University. With the excitement of this auspicious achievement, we have decided to combine our outstanding Arntzen lecture with a sunset dinner at the Botanical Gardens. This is an invitation-only event!
Join us
Thursday, Nov. 14, 2024, 5 - 8 p.m.
Dorrance Center at the Desert Botanical Garden
1201 N. Galvin Parkway, Phoenix, AZ 85008
Sunset dinner, founders panel, and special lecture
Enjoy a sunset dinner at the world-renowned Desert Botanical Garden while hearing insights from our early founders, who were each instrumental in launching and running the Biodesign Institute. Then be captivated by chemist and Nobel laureate Carolyn Bertozzi’s insights in her Arntzen Grand Challenges lecture.
Arntzen Grand Challenges lecture
Sweet revenge on cancer: How studying sugars may change the practice of oncology
Presented by Carolyn Bertozzi, Nobel laureate, Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Chemical and Systems Biology and Radiology (by courtesy) at Stanford University, and an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Complex sugars, which scientists call glycans, cover the surfaces of all living cells, where they serve as a molecular barcode that reports on the health status of the cell. Cancer cells are known to change the structures and abundances of certain glycans, most prominently those that include a sugar-building block called sialic acid. Consequently, cancer cells have more sialic acids on their surface than healthy, normal cells. We discovered that this dense thicket of sialic acids allows cancer cells to escape recognition by our immune system, which allows the cancer to grow and spread. This finding motivated us to develop a new kind of cancer immune therapy that functions as a “lawnmower,” cutting the disease sugars off cancer cells so that the immune system can recognize them as diseased and kill them.
