2025 ASXL Research Symposium program

Sunday, October 19 - Monday, October 20, 2025
Simmons University
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A.

The annual ASXL Research Symposium brings together scientists and clinicians from around the world to drive ASXL research forward. This meeting seeks to build and support a foundation of research upon which therapeutic treatments and standards of care can be developed for ASXL-related disorders. This highly collaborative and intimate meeting cultivates new collaborations and facilitates the sharing of data, knowledge, reagents, and resources.

This meeting is for scientists and research professionals. The next meeting that will include the ASXL Family Conference will be in 2026 (date and location to be announced).

Schedule at a glance

Sunday, October 19
All day

  • Basic and translational science talks

  • Workshop sessions

  • Poster session including trainee posters

Monday, October 20
Half-day

  • Clinical research talks

Full agenda

Sunday, October 19

Schedule subject to change

Welcome
8:30-9:00am

Molecular mechanisms of ASXL proteins
9:00-10:30am

  • Karim-Jean Armache, PhD

    NYU Grossman School of Medicine

    Structural Mechanisms of Epigenetic Regulation: Insights into PR-DUB and ASXL1 Function

    Bio
  • Lucy Doyle

    University of Edinburgh

    Mechanisms of PR-DUB in neurodevelopment

  • Jürg Müller, PhD

    Max-Planck Institute of Biochemistry

    The low complexity region in Asx and its mechanism for targeting PR-DUB to DNA

    Bio

Developmental biology and pathogenic models of ASXL disorders

11:00am-12:30pm

  • Thomas Koehnke, MD, PhD

    Stanford University

    Modeling ASXL1 mutations in primary human stem cells

    Bio
  • Lu Wang, PhD

    Northwestern University

    Molecular dissection of the gene essentiality and transcriptional reprogramming in cancer

    Bio

Networking lunch
12:30-1:30pm

Functional genomics and chemical biology approaches in ASXL disorders

1:30-3:00pm

  • Ollie Bell, PhD

    Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California

    Developing chemical probes against PRC1 to investigate the pathogenic mechanisms

    Bio
  • Clement Chow, PhD

    University of Utah

    Flying to the clinic: Drug repurposing of ASXL syndromes

    Bio
  • Tomasz Cierpicki, PhD

    University of Michigan

    Discovery of small molecule inhibitors of Polycomb Repressive Complex 1 as novel therapeutic agents

    Bio

Workshops
3:30-5:00pm

  • Biochemistry and molecular biology

    Focus groups: Technical problems, negative data, collaborations, and resources

  • Developmental and translational biology

    Focus groups: Technical problems, negative data, collaborations, and resources

  • Clinical research

    Workshop: Developing a severity assessment for ASXL-related disorders

Poster session and reception
5:30-7:00pm

Monday, October 20

Insights from the ASXL family community: Barriers and motivations to research participation
8:30-9:00am

Improving neurodevelopmental phenotyping, outcome assessment, and intervention in ASXL-related disorders: Lessons from habilitative therapies

9:00-10:30am

  • Beate Peter, PhD, CCC-SLP

    Arizona State University

    Knowledge is Power: How to leverage speech and language profiles of children with Bainbridge-Ropers syndrome toward improving outcomes

    Bio
  • Julia T. O'Connor, PhD

    Kennedy Krieger Institute

    Qualitative analysis to understanding behavior challenges in ASXL-related disorders

    Bio
  • Heather B. McLean, PT, MPT, CBIS

    Kennedy Krieger Institute

    Gross motor observations from the 2024 ASXL Family Conference: A physical therapy perspective

    Bio
  • Kristina T. Johnson, PhD

    Northeastern University

    Language and communication for individuals with complex neurodevelopmental differences

    Bio

Additional clinical research session to be determined

11:00am-12:30pm

Not just a scientific meeting

You can contribute to improving the lives of hundreds of families living with ASXL-related disorders by attending the ASXL Research Symposium. There are so many unanswered questions — and we need your help to answer them.

ASXL Research Symposium Program Committee

  • Valerie Arboleda, MD, PhD

    UCLA

  • Stephanie Bielas, PhD

    University of Michigan

  • Eric Conway, PhD

    University College Dublin

  • Natasha N. Ludwig, PhD

    Kennedy Krieger Institute and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine

  • Bianca Russell, MD

    UCLA

  • Wen-Hann Tan, BMBS

    Boston Children’s Hospital

2024 ASXL Research Symposium

Program and speaker details