ISEH 2024 Annual Scientific Meeting - Highlights from the New Investigators Committee
We would like to start our highlights with a picture from one of our trainees from the New Investigators session: Dr. Xinjian Mao was showing the reconstitution of mouse E11.5 trunk section by Slide-seq and Merfish.
Green cells: aortic endothelial cells, Red cells: mesenchymal stromal cells
Day 1) Session on hematological malignancies and the New Investigator Pre-meeting Workshop
The first day of the meeting started with a session on hematologic malignancies and the newest approaches/therapies for targeting epigenetic pathways or apoptosis. While the scientists were slowly arriving to the meeting that officially started the day after, our team started to get ready in the Riverwalk room for our pre-meeting workshop. This meeting offers a unique opportunity to share and show your finding to a panel of experts in a small intimate atmosphere. 40 students/postdocs presented their work in front of 3 jury members receiving constructive feedback to help them progress at early stages of their career.
This year, it was organized by Dr. Adam C. Wilkinson (University of Oxford, UK), Dr. Louise Purton (University of Melbourne, Australia), Dr. Gemma Kelly (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, Australia) and Dr. Samanta Mariani (University of Edinburgh). The students gave interesting talks on direct reprogramming to study dendritic cells, a new identified population of IA-HSCs that are involved in trained immunity, a more quiescent population of Gprasp2high and how malaria affects HSCs differently. This year’s topic of the Pre-meeting workshop was collaborations, that’s why the ISEH New Investigators Committee invited two speakers (Dr. Kellie Machlus, Harvard Medical School, and Dr. David Kent, University of York) to give us their insights on efficient collaborations, and how important it is for your scientific career. Successful collaboration can save both time and resources while bringing together diverse scientific expertise. Kellie mentioned that, at times, her motivation for collaborating is simply the desire to work with certain individuals.
The “take-home” message was that you should talk to PIs and connect with people whenever you can, whether it’s during a conference or webinars. A lot of opportunities arise from having a casual conversation outside the scientific sessions.
Day 2) A mentee's kind words to their mentor, Keisuke Ito’s highlights and the science presented at our meeting
This year’s meeting started with our 2024 ISEH awardee for the Donald Metcalf Award (Dr. Emmanuelle Passegue, Columbia Stem Cell Initiative, New York, USA) who was kindly introduced by her former trainee Dr. Eric Pietras. She provided an overview of her past and ongoing research projects, focusing on the goal of preserving stem cell functionality and identity. Her work explores NHEJ DNA repair, controlled protein production, and her latest findings on nucleolar stress in aged HSCs.
Across four days, we hosted 29 invited speakers, 27 short talk presenters, 12 featured poster presentations, and 246 poster presentations. The scientific sessions encompassed a broad spectrum of topics, ranging from developmental and adult hematopoiesis, lymphoid biology, and metabolism to clonal hematopoiesis and aging.
Prof. Keisuke Ito, our Experimental Hematology editor and Board of Directors member, shared his key takeaways with us, including insights from the IPSCs and gene therapy sessions, as well as the session on hematological malignancies held the day before the meeting began. He emphasized that one of ISEH’s greatest strengths is its focus on normal hematopoiesis, distinguishing it from ASH and other hematology conferences.
This year’s Presidential Symposium featured three speakers: Dr. Doug Higgs, Dr. Elizabeth Ng, and Dr. Leonard Zon. We were particularly eager to hear more about repetitive elements. When asked, Dr. Zon directed us to his paper, set to be published in Science (Rodrigues, 2024) one week after our meeting.
With IPSCs being a hot topic right now, we'd like to highlight Dr. Elizabeth Ng's presentation, where she shared her team's work on generating IPSCs using a transgene-free protocol. These IPSCs can be differentiated to produce functional HSCs (iHSCs) with robust long-term, multilineage engraftment potential compared to cord blood cells and they mature effectively in vivo."
New findings on clonal hematopoiesis (CHIP) were presented by Dr. Katie A. Matatall, a postdoc of Katherine King, building on Dr. Jaiswals work showing that CHIP is associated with protection from Alzheimer’s disease (Bouzid, 2023). Dnmt3a -/- mice showed decreased microglia activation compared to WT and fewer peripheral immune cells infiltrating the brain. Tet2-/- mice showed increased amyloid plaque clearance and increased microglia activation, while having a higher percentage of activated infiltrating myeloid cells within the brain compared to WT.
Dr. Jennifer Trowbridge delivered another insightful talk on CHIP, revealing that Dnmt3a mutant HSCs exhibit enhanced mitochondrial function and increased oxidative phosphorylation. This raises the question of whether these cells rely on altered metabolism. Her team demonstrated that treating Dnmt3a mutant HSCs with MitoQ, an orally available supplement that accumulates in mitochondria, can reduce oxidative phosphorylation and diminish their competitive advantage when compared to wild-type cells. Additionally, her postdoc, Dr. Jayna J. Mistry, highlighted the critical role of a pro-inflammatory environment in supporting CHIP clones. She showed that removing inflammation in engraftment studies can disrupt the competitive advantage of HSPCs.
Day 3) 50 Flaws of Students, NIC sessions and lovely tributes to remember ISEH giants Drs. Connie Eaves and Makio Ogawa
Meet the Experts Breakfast Mixer
This year’s New Investigators Meet the Experts Mixer had a refreshing twist, taking place during breakfast on a sunny Chicago Saturday morning, instead of in the evening in the past years. The format remained similar to the past events, offering students and postdocs the opportunity to engage in informal and interactive conversations with some of this year’s ISEH award winners and invited speakers. Each participant had the chance to meet three experts, where they could discuss their science, career trajectory and how to overcome some of the challenges associated with an academic career path. A huge thank you to our experts this year including Drs Ravi Majeti (Standford, US), Robert Signer (UCSD, US), Marella de Bruijn (Oxford, UK), Leila Perie (Curie, France), David Kent (York, UK), Kellie Machlus (Harvard, US), Katherine King (Baylor, US), Elizabeth Ng (MCRI, Australia), JJ Schuringa (UMCG, the Netherlands), Momoko Yoshimoto (Western Michigan, US), Toshio Suda (Keio, Japan), Ana Cvejic (Copenhagen, Denmark), Anna Beaudin (Utah, US), Leonard Zon (Harvard, US) and Marjorie Brand (UW-Madison, US).
With some attendees absent, a few of us joined in on conversations. The one with Dr. Leonard Zon was an absolute delight. He came prepared with a list of 50 flaws of student, such as not asking questions during meetings, procrastination, or giving boring presentations. Through examples of former students, he demonstrated his commitment to helping each of them to overcome their flaws, no matter what they were. Dr. Ana Cvejic also shared the challenges of assembling large patient cohorts with Down’s Syndrome and praised her team of bioinformaticians, who are always ready when the data arrives. This meeting provided an excellent opportunity to connect with PIs.
New Investigator Career Session
In addition to the scientific sessions, the NIC also organized a career development session dedicated to learning about different career paths. This year, we invited three exceptional panelists – Dr. Jeffrey Mosenson, (Senior Medical Science Liaison, Amgen), Dr. Leah Hogdal (Director of Translational Oncology, Pfizer), and Dr. Keisuke Ito, (Professor, Albert Einstein College of Medicine) – all of whom have prior or current experience in the hematology field. Our moderator and NIC member, Vu Tran, perfectly introduced our panelists before leading a Q&A session with attendees. The trainees asked questions about various topics, including daily routines, Dr. Hogdal's early days at the start-up, and the transitions between academia and industry or back to academia. The panelists offered valuable insights and recommendations drawn from their experiences and deep expertise. Overall, the session was both engaging and educational, providing a significant learning opportunity for the trainees.
New Investigator Award Session
Before summarizing the NIC session, we would like to express our gratitude to Dr. David Kent and Dr. Keisuke Ito for their heartfelt tribute of two exceptional scientists: Dr. Connie Eaves and Dr. Makio Ogawa. Dr. Connie Eaves, a distinguished editor of our journal Experimental Hematology and a member of the society for over 50 years, dedicated herself tirelessly to advancing science and creating opportunities for emerging scientists. Dr. Makio Ogawa's contributions to experimental hematology and his unwavering commitment to the ISEH society are equally remarkable. Dr. Ogawa worked with immense energy, consistently pushing for scientific progress and fostering opportunities for the next generation of researchers.
This year’s New Investigator Award Session was moderated by our NIC member, Els Mansell.
This session is very popular because it regroups the best-scoring abstract submitted by PhD/MD and post-doctoral trainees. We were lucky to be joined by Dr. Leila Perié (Curie Institute, France) as the NIC Invited Speaker. She presented us an overview of new tools to produce and analyze barcoding data (DRAG mouse, a VDJ-based system). The goal of this session is to highlight talented trainees that are part of the ISEH community, and how their research is having a significant impact in the field of hematopoiesis. This year, we invited Justin Thomas (Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, USA), Andy Zeng (Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Canada) and Zhiqian Zheng (University of Tokyo, Japan) in the PhD/MD category. For the postdoctoral fellows, we invited Dr. Charles Dussiau (EMBL and DKFZ, Germany), Dr. Maria Jassinskaja (York Biomedical Research Institute, UK) and Dr. Xinjian Mao (Stowers Institute for Medical Research, USA). All the speakers delivered exceptional presentations and as expected, had to address a wide range of questions from the audience. The first prize winners were Andy Zeng (student prize) and Dr. Maria Jassinskaja (postdoc prize).
Day 4) 238 ways of representing a dollar, the New Investigator Technology Session, a cruise on the Chicago river and soon Kumamoto, Japan
We also had a fantastic talk from the 2024 ISEH awardee of the Janet Rowley Award Dr. Robert Signer, from the University of California San Diego, USA who talked about finding a balance between stem cells and life. He demonstrated that HSCs have unusually low protein synthesis rates, even when they begin to cycle, as well as reduced proteasome capacity. He also explained how increased translational fidelity helps to preserve these cells. He started and ended his story with 238 ways of representing a dollar, drawing a parallel to the crucial importance of maintaining a healthy work-life balance.
Dr. Mitchell Weiss began his talk with the memorable phrase, “Put your pants out of your socks,” as he delved into the hereditary resistance some individuals have to sickle cell disease, in which HbF expression persists throughout life. Different approaches to affect the genetic regulation of y-to-ß globin gene switching through new gene therapies such as Cas9 disruption of BCL11A, adenine base editors (ABEs) or re-methylation of the y-globin gene via epigenetic editing with dCas9 were discussed. Reversing this developmental switch through genetic modification of HSCs represents a promising therapeutic strategy.
New Investigator Technology Session
For the NIC Technology session, we welcomed our three selected speakers to talk to us about organoids. Dr. Svendsen, Franziska Mey and Dr. Ren introduced us to the fascinating world of mimicking the hematopoietic system in vitro. The discussion centered about their vision on the technology for the next five to ten years, and what they thought the key next advances would be. At this early stages of the technology, organoid cultures rely on constant media changes with very careful pipetting for adequate nutrient exchange and debris removal. Another current limitation of the technology is the success rate at which an investigator can consistently get homogeneous and reproducible organoid. This success rate is currently low, around 10% even in experienced labs. Therefore, their 5-year wish list is: to emulate blood flow across the system, which could get rid of debris and death cells, and to improve the consistency and reproducibility of the cultures. However, as Franziska Mey pointed out, the heterogeneity of organoids can also be seen as an opportunity to emulate different cell subpopulations and differences that would be seen in between every individual in vivo.
We ended our meeting with a fascinating talk from the McCulloch and Till Awardee Dr. Ravi Majeti, from the Stanford University, USA on truncating ASXL1 mutations and how they induce progression to myeloid malignancies. He continued his talk on IDH1 genes, DNMT3A and the trick of culturing AML cells. These were extremely inspiring award talks because they showed us a global picture of each scientist and their research, but also how they got to where they are now through good mentorship.
A Cruise on the Chicago River
The grand finale of ISEH 2024 was an exciting river cruise along the Chicago River, offering breathtaking views of the city's iconic skyline. The evening began with drinks by the water and as we drifted away from the heart of Chicago, a guide provided fascinating insights into the city's architectural history. After a delicious dinner, trainees and PIs conquered the dance floor to show off their dancing skills. Upon returning to the starting point, the night was still young, so PIs and trainees headed to the Boss bar for another round of drinks, generously covered by the PIs. It was a memorable way to conclude an outstanding conference and an unforgettable event!
We have now left The Windy City, but we will see you at the 2025 ISEH Annual Scientific Meeting in the beautiful city of Kumamoto, Japan where we have been kindly invited by Dr. Toshio Suda!
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Blog post contributed by the ISEH New Investigators Committee
Please note that the statements made by Simply Blood authors are their own views and not necessarily the views of ISEH. ISEH disclaims any or all liability arising from any author's statements or materials.
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