Organized by Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Moderna, UMass Chan Medical School, Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), Nature Biotechnology, Nature Immunology, Nature, Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, and Nature Biomedical Engineering

The conference will discuss the development of nucleic acid medicines — both the recent clinical successes, and current and upcoming challenges. By bringing together academics in basic and translational research and their peers in thriving biotechnology companies and promising start-ups, the conference aims to foster dialog and to spearhead collaborations. The first day (October 17, 2023) will bring awareness of R&D driven by biotechnology companies developing nucleic acid medicines, and discuss career paths for students and early career researchers to become the next-generation of leaders in biotechnology. The following two days will discuss what should be learnt from late-stage and approved nucleic acid gene therapies and vaccines, and highlight promising preclinical therapeutic modalities — in particular, genome and epigenome editing, and the design of new RNA therapeutics — and machine learning and bioinformatic tools accelerating the development of emerging nucleic acid therapies and vaccines.