Speaker Profile
Founder & CEO, Ligandal
Biography
Watsons current work focuses on AI-driven biomolecular design, creating predictive peptides and receptor-targeting ligands that are engineered to precisely deliver nanoparticles, gene-editing tools, drugs, and nucleic acids to specific cells and tissues. This approach aims to enhance therapeutic specificity, reduce toxicity, and accelerate the development of curative and preventative delivery of therapeutics. Previously, while researching at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, he developed gene-editing delivery platforms for guided nucleases like CRISPR and TALEN. Today, he applies AI and predictive physics to rapidly generate and evaluate novel targeting agents, mapping uncharted receptor-ligand relationships as an enabling technology for biopharmaceutical delivery systems. With over 80 pending global patents (22 approved, 6 allowed), Watsons work pioneered integrating cell surface transcriptomics, predictive targeting ligand design, and drug and gene delivery systems. He and his team aim to transform how we approach the worlds most challenging diseases, advancing the frontier of precision therapeutics and diagnostically-responsive medicine.
Session Abstract – PMWC 2026 Silicon Valley
Track Chair:
Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures and Gad Getz, Broad Institute
PMWC Award Ceremony
• Steve Wozniak, Apple
• Greg Brockman, OpenAI
Fireside Chat
• Vinod Khosla, Khosla Ventures
• Greg Brockman, OpenAI
Target Discovery: Beyond Genomics – Revealing Hidden Layers of Biology with AI
• Keynote: Stephen Quake, CZ Biohub
• Chair: Cindy Lawley, Olink
• Aritro Nath, City of Hope
• Massa Shoura, Phinomics
• Omar Serang, DNAnexus
Accelerating Immunotherapy Discovery Through Multimodal AI
• Ron Alfa, Noetik
A Data-Integrated Approach to Target and Biomarker Discovery
• Liat Dassa, Cytoreason
Harmonizing Data to Accelerate Drug Discovery
• Vitalay Fomin, Numenos
Closing the Loop: Coupling AI with In Vivo Validation
• Gabriel Musso, Biosymetrics
Interpretable AI for Biomarker Discovery: Accelerating Drug Development
• Sanoj Punnen, University of Miami
• Shivanni Kummar, OHSU
• Mark Burkard, UI
Can AI Really Create the Next Blockbuster Drug?
• Chair: Amar Das, Guardant Health
• Ari Caroline, Weave Bio
• Dina Katabi, Emerald/MIT
• Andrei Georgescu, Vivodyne
• James Zou, Stanford
Gemini Digital Twins Accelerate Precision Medicine
• Collin Hill, Aitia
Scaling Rare Disease Discovery with AI
• Lisa Gurry, GeneDx
Enabling Targeted Precision Drug & Gene Delivery with Predictive AI
• Andre Watson, Ligandal
Is AI the New Drug or the New Therapeutic Modality
• Chair: Alex Morgan, Khosla Ventures
• Michael J. Kahana, Nia Therapeutics
• Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Xaira
