Program

Thursday 28th May 2026

09:30 AM Registration and coffee/tea
10:15 AM Welcome remarks Michel Krall Jürgens (CEO) & Yuji Tsurubuchi (Country Manager, JP) - Sophion Bioscience
10:25 AM Housekeeping Duncan Jarman (Sales Manager) - Sophion Bioscience
Session 1 Chair: Makoto Tominaga - Nagoya City University, Japan
10:30 AM Deadly cures: using venomous animals to develop personalised anti-seizure medications Glenn King - The University of Queensland, Australia
10:55 AM Pathophysiological roles of cardiac IKs channels Junko Kurokawa - University of Sizuoka, Japan
11:20 AM Drug Discovery for Itch and Pain Targeting Ion Channels Xiaoguang Lei - Peking University, China
11:45 AM Uniquely evolved plant K⁺ transporters Nobuyuki Uozumi - Tohoku University, Japan
12:10 PM Lunch, exhibits and poster presentations (odd numbers)
Session 2 Chair: Yoshihiro Kubo - affiliation TBA
01:45 PM TRPC channel modulation as a therapeutic target Reiko Sakaguchi - University of Occupational and Environmental Health, Japan
02:10 PM AMPA receptors under the knife: How RNA editing and alternative splicing co-evolved to sculpt brain signaling Derek Bowie - McGill University, Canada
02:35 PM The extracellular K+-gated anion channels Takushi Shimomura - National Institute of Physiocal Science, Japan
03:00 PM TCM-based ion channel drug discovery Jian Yang - Shenzhen Medical Academy of Research and Translation, China
03:25 PM Tea/coffee - Lunch, exhibits and poster presentations (even numbers)
Session 3 Chair: Damian Bell - Sophion Bioscience, Denmark
04:00 PM Role for the small GTPase Rem2 in dopaminergic regulation of synaptic release Ryan Alexander - University of California, San Francisco, USA
04:25 PM Visualizing P2X Ion Channels: Optical Probes for P2X7R and PET Tracers for the Imaging of P2X4 and P2X7 Receptor Expression Anna Junker - University Tübingen, Germany
04:50 PM Chemical strategies for fluorescent visualization of endogenous AMPA receptor trafficking during synaptic plasticity Shigeki Kiyonaka - Nagoya University, Japan
05:15 PM News & Views from Sophion Sophion Bioscience
05:40 PM Closing remarks and wrap up Duncan Jarman - Sophion Bioscience
06:00 PM Dinner reception Yuji Tsurubuchi & Michel Krall Jürgens - Sophion Bioscience
08:00 PM Closing remarks

Friday 29th May 2026

09:15 AM Tea/coffee
09:15 AM Welcome remarks Yuji Tsurubuchi - Sophion Bioscience, Japan
Session 4 Chair: Glenn King - The University of Queensland, Australia
09:35 AM Nav1.4s are dispensable for muscle contractions in zebrafish. Souhei Sakata, Osaka Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Japan
10:00 AM Structural Basis of Lipid Gating of Inwardly Rectifying Potassium Channels: Can the G-Loop be the Main Gate Sun-Joo Lee - Washington University, USA
10:25 AM Effects of horizontal and vertical electric fields on lipid bilayers Eiji Yamamoto - Keio University, Japan
10:50 AM Tea/coffee - Exhibits and poster session
Session 5 Chair: Kazuya Tsurudome - Sophion Bioscience, Japan
11:40 AM Electrophysiological Approaches to Decipher Endosomal TRPML2 Channel Function Cheng-Chang Chen - National Taiwan University, Taiwan
12:05 PM (Tentative) Assessment of drug-induced inotropic changes using human iPSC-derived 3D engineered cardiac tissues: A comparison with a 2D cardiomyocytes model Yoshiko Okai - Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited, Japan
12:30 PM TBA Sophion Bioscience
12:55 PM Lunch, Exhibits and Posters (odd number)
Session 6 Chair: Yasushi Okamura - University of Osaka
02:25 PM Effects of different modulators on the structural, dynamic and functional properties of the human potassium Kir2.1 Catherine Vénien-Bryan - Sorbonne University, France
02:50 PM Subcellular compartmentalization of voltage-gated ion channels at the axon initial segment in vivo Yilin Tai - Fudan University, China
03:15 PM Beyond the Block: Dissecting hERG Channel Modulation for Safer Drug Development Kazuharu Furutani - Tokushima Bunri University, Japan
03:40 PM Poster Award Ceremony Damian Bell - Sophion Bioscience, Denmark
03:45 PM Closing remarks and wrap up Michel Krall Jürgens - Sophion Bioscience, Denmark

The agenda is subject to change. Speakers, session titles, and other details may be updated or altered without prior notice. Please check for updates closer to the event. The organizers are not responsible for any inconvenience caused by these changes.