Peter Senter of Seattle Genetics to deliver 2018 David Chu Lecture on Feb. 13

The topic of the lecture is “Antibody-based therapeutics for cancer therapy: An early stage research to a clinically approved drug.” The lecture will be followed by a reception in the Panasci Atrium.

Senter joined Seattle Genetics in August 1998 and has served as its Vice President of Chemistry since September 2002. In this role, he heads Seattle Genetics' chemistry department, which carries out research in antibody-drug conjugate technologies, including the development of potent drug payloads, novel linker systems, conjugation methodology and mechanism of action studies. In February 2009, Dr. Senter was recognized as the company's first Distinguished Fellow.

Dr. Senter previously worked at Cytokine Networks, Inc., the Bristol-Myers Squibb Pharmaceutical Research Institute and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute at Harvard Medical School.

Senter received his AB in Biochemistry from the University of California, Berkeley, his PhD in Chemistry from the University of Illinois, and did postdoctoral research at the Max Planck Institute of Experimental Medicine in Göttingen, Germany. He is the Senior Editor of Molecular Cancer Therapeutics (published by the American Association of Cancer Research) and serves as an Affiliate Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Washington. He has authored more than 150 scientific publications and holds more than 40 patents.  His research interests include targeted drug delivery, protein chemistry and biochemistry, and anti-cancer drug design.

David C. K. Chu, PhD, and his wife, Jane Chu, established the David Chu Lectureship at UB in 2011. David Chu is a distinguished research professor emeritus of pharmaceutical and biomedical sciences at the College of Pharmacy, University of Georgia. He earned a PhD in medicinal chemistry from the University at Buffalo in 1975 under the mentorship of Professor Thomas Bardos. Dr. Chu was one of the co-founders of Pharmasset and ATEA Pharmaceuticals.  During his 40-year career, Dr. Chu trained more than 130 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows and has maintained an active research program in drug design and synthesis since his retirement in 2008.  He has published over 300 peer-reviewed articles in organic, biochemical and medicinal chemistry and has been awarded more than 60 US patents. Several of his invented compounds are undergoing clinical trials in the therapeutic areas of cancer, hepatitis B virus, HIV and shingles. An elected member of the American Association of Advancement of Science and the National Academy of Inventors, Dr. Chu received the Antonin Holy Memorial Lecture Award from the International Society Antiviral Research and the Willis G. Gregory Award from the UB School of Pharmacy in 2017.  He also received the Alma Mater of the Year Award from Seoul National University in 2015, the John A. Montgomery Award from the International Round Table Society in 2014, a MERIT Award from the National Institute of Health in 2001, and the UGA Inventor of the Year Award in 2002.