[Seminar] John G. Aunins

Title: Development of Live Bacterial Therapeutic

Speaker: John G. Aunins

Abstract: The initial NIH Human Microbiome and EU MetaHit Projects that were completed in the early 2010 ’s sparked an intense interest in the impact of, and ways to manipulate, the microbial ecologies that live on the human body. “Bugs as Drugs” is an emerging therapeutic modality for treatment of diseases identified as caused by, or correlated with, the microbiome. The rationale for pursuing these therapies is multi fold, but largely revolves around the often complex and multifactorial biology of these diseases, and poor druggability via more conventional approaches For Seres treatment approach via ecologies of natural commensal microorganisms,the challenge is not to ‘ biosynthetic pathways in individual organisms, à la synthetic biology or metabolic engineering, but rather to engineer a set of organisms that will work to shift a diseased microbiome to one resembling that of a healthy person A unique set of capabilities is required to identify strains of interest (and disinterest), screen leads and to test model ecologies This is interfaced with bioprocess, analytical and formulation know how, along with cGMP manufacturing capabilities, to enable investigational medicinal product generation and commercialization Approaches to, and progress in, product development will be discussed.

Short CV: John Aunins is the Executive Vice President of Bioprocess Manufacturing and the Chief Technology Officer of Seres. He has more than 26 years of experience in the biotechnology industry, with a focus in bioprocess development, manufacturing support, and project leadership Prior to joining Seres he led process and product development teams at Merck Research Laboratories for Vaqta ®, Varivax ®, Zostavax®, ProQuad ®, Rotateq ®, and Gardasil® The Vaqta and Gardasil process teams were awarded with ACS Industrial Biotechnology Awards for innovation, contribution to bioengineering, and societal impact Dr Aunins is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and was recently awarded with D I C Wang Award for Excellence in Biochemical Engineering He has authored over 50 articles and book chapters, and has chaired five international conferences in vaccines and bioprocess technology Dr Aunins earned his Ph D in chemical engineering from MIT, in 1989 under Professor Daniel I C Wang Dr John Aunins is also visiting Professor at ITQB NOVA and member of iBET’s Scientific Advisory
Board.