On the occasion of the 80th birthday of Prof. Kopeček, a close knit collection of alumni, colleagues, collaborators, friends and family gathered on February 7-8, 2020 in the snowy Salt Lake City valley shadowed by the Wasatch Mountain range to celebrate the career of our esteemed mentor and friend, Jindrich (Henry) Kopeček. Attendees came from USA, Canada, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Israel, Japan, Korea, The Netherlands, Switzerland, and Taiwan with total number close to 150. Eight members of US National Academies took active part in the conference. Two days of excellent research presentations, combined with friendly banter and laughter, created an atmosphere that mirrored Henry’s love of science and friends.
- Henry presented keynote lecture My First Sixty Years in Science
- Lian, Jiawei, and Chris presented posters in this Symposium:
- • L. Li. J. Wang, J. Yang, J. Kopeček, Cell-Surface Crosslinking of CD20 Antigens to Treat Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma
- • L. Li, Y. Li, D.C. Radford, J. Wang, J. Kopeček, J. Yang, Polymer-Enhanced Combination of Immunogenic Chemotherapy and PD-L1 Degradation.
- • J. Wang, Y. Li, L. Li, J. Kopeček, Exploration and Evaluation of Therapeutic Efficacy of Drug-Free Macromolecular Therapeutics in Collagen-Induced Rheumatoid Arthritis Mouse Model.
- • D.C. Radford, J. Yang, M.C. Doan, L. Li, A.S. Dixon, S.C. Owen, J. Kopeček, Hyper-Crosslinking HER2 Receptors with Multivalent HPMA Copolymer-Based Nanoconjugate Overcomes Endocytosis Resistance and Enhances Cytotoxicity.
The winners of poster awards, supported by leading journals (Biomaterials, Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews, and Journal of Controlled Release) were Ling Ding, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Takahiro Nomoto, Tokyo Institute of Technology, and Chris Radford, University of Utah.
The Symposium main sponsors were Arcturus Therapeutics (San Diego, CA) and Alumni of Biomedical Polymers Laboratory (Kopeček Laboratory), University of Utah (Salt Lake City, UT). Many institutions and friends also made contributions to this unique event. The organizing committee thanks all our contributors for their generous financial support of this conference.
