Keynote presentation 1: The Long and Winding RAS Road: some reflections
Tracks
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| Tuesday, July 14, 2026 |
| 4:45 PM - 5:30 PM |
Overview
Australasian Society of Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists (ASCEPT) Lecture I Prof Robert Widdop
Details
This presentation will detail the work conducted by Robert Widdop and team on the role of the renin angiotensin system (RAS) in cardiovascular disease. It will provide reflections on how this indispensable system that regulates blood pressure and fluid homeostasis continues to provide novel opportunities for drug discovery. While renin was discovered over a century ago, there are still novel components of the RAS being discovered in recent decades, together with new methods to modulate classical RAS biology.
This presentation will discuss how the manipulation of various components of the RAS can exert protective effects on the cardiovascular system. In particular, blockade of the classical ACE-AT1 receptor axis has been the RAS Road much travelled. Indeed, such strategies were so successful in treating hypertension that it took decades to establish the dogma that there were alternative Roads on the RAS superhighway and that, in many instances, remodelling extracellular matrix via non-AT1R targets was more notable than blood pressure reductions. A focus of this presentation will be on AT2R pharmacology since activation of this arm of the RAS exerts protective anti-fibrotic effects and often counter-regulates AT1R activation, with endogenous angiotensin peptides likely to act as endogenous AT2R ligands.
Of note, a number of angiotensin metabolites exert markedly different cardiovascular effects compared with the parent peptide angiotensin II. For example, angiotensin III is thought to activate AT2R whereas angiotensin IV- initially considered as a ligand for AT4R- is now known to be an inhibitor of the enzyme insulin regulated aminopeptidase (IRAP). Thus, the Winding RAS Road is continuing to evolve given that AT4R has been identified as IRAP. Drug discovery programs for both AT2R and IRAP will be briefly described, as examples of drug targets for fibrosis.
Of course, none of the work described would be possible without great support from my own mentors and laboratory, as well as local and international collaborators who are not just colleagues but friends discussing shared interests, usually in picturesque surroundings. During the course of my career, hopefully, I have enthused the next generation of pharmacologists to marvel and embrace all things RAS and beyond!
Speaker
Prof Robert Widdop
Monash University
The Long and Winding RAS Road: some reflections
Biography
Rob Widdop obtained his PhD from Monash University and did postdocs at the Austin Hospital and in the United Kingdom, followed by NHMRC Research Fellowships at Monash University.
He has headed an independent laboratory (1993-) focused primarily on the biology and pathophysiology of modifying the renin-angiotensin system (RAS) in cardiovascular disease, and is involved in drug discovery programs to develop novel therapeutics for fibrosis. He was elected as a Fellow of the British Pharmacological Society and a Fellow of the American Heart Association.
Rob has held executive positions in two major Australian societies. In particular, he was Co-Editor of ASCEPT Abstracts for the scientific AGM (1993-1997). At that time, conference abstracts were reviewed, and often returned to authors for corrections (!) prior to the AGM publication as a hard-copy Abstract Booklet. This period shaped his commitment to pharmacology while still a Research Fellow.
For the past 20+ years, Rob has been a Teaching & Research academic (2001-), and Professor and Head of Department of Pharmacology, Monash University (2011-). He has maintained novel research programs that have translational potential including: >AUD$19M in Category 1 funding, Co-Inventor on 3 independent patent families, with his IP resulting in the spinout company Inosi Therapeutics.
Session chair
Luke Grundy
Flinders University
Nicola Smith
Head of Pharmacology
UNSW Sydney
