CONFERENCE REPORT
18th Naples Workshop on Bioactive Peptides
Napoli, Italy, 28-30 November 2024.
Following a long tradition started in 1988, also this year we organized the Naples Workshop on Bioactive Peptides to discuss Peptide Science in Napoli. For the first time the workshop has been held in the winter and in the historical centre of Naples. We decided to postpone the workshop from the usual date of June to the end of November to avoid any overlap with the European Peptide Symposium held in Florence last August.
The Naples workshop was held under the auspices of the European Peptide Society (EPS) and of the Italian Peptide Society (ItPS), and has been organized by the Research Centre on Bioactive Peptides (CIRPeB) at University of Naples Federico II, with the collaboration of the Department of Pharmacy, the University Luigi Vanvitelli, and by the Institute of Crystallography and the Institute of Biostructures and Bioimages of Italian CNR with the precious assistance of the organizing agency YesMeet. Chairmen of the workshop were Giancarlo Morelli, Paolo Grieco, Menotti Ruvo and Michele Saviano.
The congress has been organized in a very special venue: the Church of Saints Marcellino and Festo funded in the 7th century, now part of the University of Naples Federico II, in the historical centre of Naples. The church, now deconsecrated, is accessible from the pleasant cloister of San Marcellino where lunches have been served, and is primarily used for cultural events. This very special venue was particularly appreciated by all participants.
The event, started in the afternoon of Thursday November 28, after that the morning was dedicated to the Scientific day of the CIRPeB, has had a high attendance of over 170 scientists of different countries from all over the world.
The topics of the workshop were:
- Peptides in clinical phases
- Radiolabelled and conjugated peptides for diagnosis and therapy
- Macrocycles and structural constrains in peptides
- Bioactive peptides
- New synthetic approaches
- Peptides in Chemical Biology
- Peptide Materials and Cosmeceuticals, the innovative applications of the Biomimetic
Peptides
The theme of the workshop concerning the state of the art on Bioactive Peptides was covered by nine plenary lectures, thirty oral presentations, and two poster sessions. A special session was dedicated to contributions by companies. All the three intense days were completely dedicated to the peptide science.
The following plenary lectures were presented by distinguished scientists coming from all over the world:
Horst Kessler – TUM Garching (Germany): Integrin-ligands for medical applications.
Meritxell Teixido – Gate2Brain – Barcellona (Spain): Gate2Brain blood-brain barrier shuttle
peptides, from discovery to applications and going beyond small molecules.
Rosalba Mansi – University Hospital Basel (CH): Radiopharmaceuticals Targeting GPCRs: Exploring the Features of Antagonists.
Frank Caruso – University of Melbourne (Australia): Nanoengineering Biomaterials: From Assembly to In Vivo Delivery and Function.
Paolo Rovero – University of Florence (Italy): AAT11RI: a retro-inverso collagen modulator peptide derived from Serpin A1 is a valuable cosmeceutical active ingredient.
Marc Devocelle – RCSI Dublin (Ireland): Combining Medicinal Chemistry approaches to modify Antimicrobial Peptides.
Norman Davey – Institute of Cancer Research – London (UK): Comprehensive characterization of peptide-binding pockets using high-throughput screening.
Paula M.T. Ferreira – Universidade do Minho Braga (Portugal): Self-Assembly of Small Peptides Featuring Dehydroamino Acids for Advanced Nanomaterials.
Paula Gomes – University of Porto (Portugal): From Merrifield to Meldal – Nobel-prized chemistries behind the development of new candidates for topical use on chronic wounds
All lectures were extremely interesting and stimulated a great participation from all the audience.
Two awards were assigned during the three days. The award in the memory of Prof. Carlo Pedone, selected among the young participants to the Scientific Day of Cirpeb, was assigned, ex-equo, to Dott. Elisabetta Rosa and Dott. Vincenzo Maria D’amore, both from Department of Pharmacy of University of Naples Federico II. The award in the memory of Prof. Luis Moroder, was selected among all young participants to the 18th Naples Workshop and was assigned to Dr. Saan Voss from Cambridge University for his excellent oral contribution entitled: Peptide-bismuth bicycles.
At the end of the scientific sessions, the gala dinner, was also much appreciated by the participants.
The Naples workshop has been a highly successful forum for the exchange of ideas on hot subjects and trends in peptide science and an important and decisive stimulus for future work in the area. The venue in the historical centre of Naples, offered to participants, beside science, the occasion of enjoying the city with its churches and its historical monuments.
Contributed by Giancarlo Morelli