In the Forefront of Science (2012, Pdf)
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IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE Lauri Aaltonen Uskali Mäki FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN CANCER GENETICS RESEARCH PHILOSOPHY OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI......................... 4 UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI......................... 8 Pertti Haapala Risto Nieminen HISTORY OF SOCIETY: FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN RETHINKING Finland 1400–2000 COMPUTATIONAL NANOSCIENCE UNIVERSITY OF TAMPERE ...................... 40 AALTO UNIVERSITY ................................ 12 Ilkka Hanski Erkki Oja FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN METAPOPULATION RESEARCH COMPUTATIONAL INFERENCE UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI....................... 41 AALTO UNIVERSITY ................................ 24 Rauno Julin Matej Orešic FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN NUCLEAR AND ACCELERATOR MOLECULAR SYSTEMS IMMUNOLOGY BASED PHYSICS AND PHYSIOLOGY RESEARCH UNIVERSITY OF JYVÄSKYLÄ .................. 32 VTT TECHNICAL RESEARCH CENTRE OF FINLAND .............................. 25 Markku Kivinen FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN Jukka Pekola RUSSIAN STUdies – CHOICES OF FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN RUSSIAN MODERNISATION LOW TEMPERATURE QUANTUM UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI, PHENOMENA AND DEVICES ALEKSANTERI INSTITUTE ....................... 20 AALTO UNIVERSITY ................................ 16 Markku Leskelä Taina Pihlajaniemi FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN ATOMIC LAYER DEPOSITION (ALD) CELL-EXTRACELLULAR MATRIX RESEARCH UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI....................... 33 UNIVERSITY OF OULU ............................ 36 Johanna Mappes Lassi Päivärinta FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN BIOLOGICAL INTERACTIONS RESEARCH INVERSE PROBLEMS RESEARCH UNIVERSITY OF JYVÄSKYLÄ .................. 28 UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI....................... 17 Marja-Leena Sorjonen FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN INTERSUBJECTIVITY IN INTERACTION UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI......................... 9 IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE 3 CENTRES OF EXCELLENCE – the flaGSHIPS OF FINNISH RESEARCH Centres of Excellence are the flagships of Finnish research. They are at the very cutting edge of science in their fields, carving out new avenues for research, developing creative research environments and training new talented researchers for Finnish society and business and industry. A Centre of Excellence is a research and training network that has a clearly defined set of research objectives and is run under a joint management. Funding is provided for a six-year term, which means that CoEs can work to long-term plans and even take risks. CoEs are jointly funded by the Academy of Finland, universities, research institutes and the private business sector. The Academy has funded Centres of Excellence since 1995. The fifth CoE programme is scheduled to run from 2012 to 2017, and it involves 15 Centres of Excellence. 4 IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE 5 Lauri Aaltonen FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN CANCER GENETICS RESEARCH UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI THE FIRST LINE IN CANCER GENETICS Cancer research in Finland is recognised as exceptionally high-quality. The field has an ambitious long-term target: to render meaningless the disease that is cancer through state- of-the-art gene technology and collaboration among leading experts from several disciplines. 6 IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE 7 Lauri Aaltonen predisposition. Clinical screening pro- grammes have been made available for FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN the individuals at risk. The incidence CANCER GENETICS RESEARCH of colon cancer, for instance, has signifi- UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI cantly decreased in at-risk families. Furthermore, together with our part- ners, we have studied how the informa- tion gained from genetic cancer research impacts people’s quality of life. In principle, our research mission will be complete once cancer has become lit- WHAT ARE THE AIMS OF tle more than a minor inconvenience. YOUR RESEARCH? And we are convinced this will happen – not during the term of this CoE, but Our CoE studies the aetiology and certainly in the long run. We would have worked together in development of cancer, focusing espe- this set-up, at least at some levels, regard- cially on hereditary predisposition to less of the outcome, but funding through tumours and somatic changes in neopla- WHAT IS IT THAT MAKES YOU the CoE programme means firm commit- sia. In recent years, genome research has A CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE? ment and a longer-term view to cooper- advanced at such a pace that we are now ation. in the position to analyse the complete When the Academy announced the We are a very significant CoE in terms genome of the individual; both the germ- CoE call, things happened very quickly of our social impact as well because we line as well as the respective tumour. But indeed. We knew how we would set are pioneering the studies of the whole our interests span a much wider range up our organisation and what research human genome. This type of informa- and cover everything from epidemi- themes we would pursue in a matter of tion is extremely valuable and at the same ology to computer science. minutes! We set ourselves the target of time sensitive, too. Genetic information Our research has fine traditions. creating a set-up of leading experts from can help improve everyone’s quality of The first CoE in hereditary disorders different fields, who together would life, but there are potential problems in Academy Professor Lauri Aaltonen research was founded in 1995, and CoEs make up a stronger force than the sum obtaining this information. The interpre- in disease genetics and translational of their individual efforts. tation of genetic information is still in its genome-scale biology followed in its other similar patients. This is a unique infancy, and the infrastructure for using footsteps. This history is reflected in the register providing details on all cancer “We’ve taken on the role that information in public healthcare, for composition of our current CoE that is cases diagnosed since 1953, a total of instance, still remains underdeveloped. composed of five teams. We are a multi- some one million patients. It serves as of bell ringer and messenger This is why we have taken on the role disciplinary unit in a way that everyone a virtual biobank and a research regis- in relation to the Ministry of of bell ringer and messenger in relation to can understand. ter with relevant information on every Social Affairs and Health the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health We are currently conducting genome- patient and tissue sample. The support and other policy-makers” and other policy-makers. Significant ben- wide analyses in lines of research that we we are receiving from the Academy efits and major drawbacks are at stake, believe hold the greatest promise. This through the CoE programme means we and making sure we can achieve the for- is generating vast quantities of data as can now hire a full-time researcher to mer and avoid the latter requires signifi- work is being done on up to a thousand work in the Cancer Registry. cant input in training and education. samples at the same time. This data flow is managed in two stages. First, using the tools of computer science, we perform HOW WILL YOUR RESEARCH sophisticated sequence analyses, sorting CHANGE THE WORLD? CoE FACTS millions of sequence reads into optimal order. This allows us to identify real dif- If our studies uncover gene mutations Total number of research staff: Just over 50 ferences between samples from among that explain hereditary tumour suscep- Sites of research: University of Helsinki and Finnish Cancer Registry the background noise. tibility, we will have at our disposal a Number of research staff recruited from abroad: Nine. We are not the most Next, our systems biologists set to predictive test. This will allow us to international unit because our research relies heavily on Finnish research work to find out which part of the vari- translate the findings into clinical tools infrastructures. ation has to do with tumour predisposi- to reduce cancer morbidity and mor- Average age of research staff: 35 years tion. Once we have formed an impres- tality. There are hundreds of families in Total budget for first three-year term (2012–2014): 22.8 million euros. sion, we conduct searches in the Finnish Finland that according to our studies Academy funding is crucial, but we also have significant funding from other Cancer Registry in order to identify show mutations indicative of hereditary sources. 8 IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE IN THE FOREFRONT OF SCIENCE 9 Uskali Mäki Marja-Leena Sorjonen FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN FINNISH CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN PHILOSOPHY OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES INTERSUBJECTIVITY IN INTERACTION UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI UNIVERSITY OF HELSINKI INTERDISCIPLINARY FOCUS ON MUTUAL BRIDGE-BUILDER UNDERSTANDING The focus of our research is on the chang- Our research focus is intersubjectiv- ing practices of knowledge production ity, the achievement and maintenance and interdisciplinary dynamics in its con- of mutual understanding in the context temporary setting. Among the main tar- of human interaction. The CoE is home gets are interdisciplinary relations within to a multilingual and multidisciplinary social sciences and between them and other community of researchers specialising fields such as cognitive neuroscience and in linguistics, social sciences and speech evolutionary biology. Through empirical