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Winter 2010 / Issue 1 INSIDEIBEC The newsletter of the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia INSIDE this issue... IBEC to New The University of coordinate initiative in Pennsylvania’s a major nanomedicine, Dennis Discher was EU-funded BioNanoMed the distinguished research Catalunya, speaker at the first project on the to be IBEC seminar of the treatment of managed by season spinal diseases IBEC /page 4 /page 2 /page 3 ...and much more! Left: Damien accepting the European Society for Biomaterials’ MySpine: Jean Leray Award in September a virtual spine for a real problem EU-funded project aims to improve treatment and prognosis of spinal diseases BEC is to coordinate a major EU-funded rational engineering approach and a user- based on the specific patient. “The results Iresearch project on the treatment of friendly software platform. will allow the recommendation of either spinal diseases. “The system will take into account replacement of the disc, doing nothing, MySpine, or ‘Functional prognosis simu- various patient-specific factors, both from or another course of treatment based on lation of patient-specific spinal treatment’, imaging data (MRI and CT scans) and safe assessment of the risks and benefits of each simulated solution to the problem,” will address current limitations in the treat- from the activity levels of the individual,” explains Damien, who earlier this year was ment and prognosis of back problems such says coordinator Damien Lacroix, head of elected president of the European Society as degenerative disc disease. At the IBEC’s Biomechanics and Mechanobiology of Biomechanics and received the European moment, clinical prognosis is largely based group, who prepared the project together Society for Biomaterials’ Jean Leray Award with postdoc Jérôme Noailly. “For example, // “MySpine brings engineering in September. “It brings new engineering spine geometries, tissue properties and rationale to the decision-making process.” rationale to the decision- loading histories – all of which vary wildly MySpine, which also involves groups from person to person – will form the cor- making process” from the Netherlands, Austria, France, nerstones of our predictive system.” Spain and Hungary, will start in March on past experience of the surgeon or trial MySpine’s main objective will be the cre- 2011 and is funded as a STREP (small or and error, which can lead to complica- ation of a computing platform to be used medium‐scale focused research project) tions and ill health following treatment or in clinical settings. This interface, as well as under FP7. It will join IBEC’s growing list surgery. MySpine aims to develop a tool the patient‐specific ‘database’ of the lumbar of coordinated EU projects, the next most to guide clinicians in making the right spine, will allow clinicians to look at short‐ recent of which was George Altankov’s decisions on how to treat various spinal or long‐term effects on tissue to explore FIBROGEL, which was selected for fund- pathologies using patient-specific data, a the possible outcomes of disc degeneration ing in September. // More project news on www.ibecbarcelona.eu: Telethon funds for collaborative Fabry project • The regeneration game: Tackling tissue morphogenesis in humans • Spanning continents: tissue regeneration project wins EU funding • ...and more! SCIENTIFIC NEWS PNAS paper for IBEC researchers esearchers in Maria Garcia-Parajo’s Using single-molecule near-field scanning demonstrates the existence of raft-based in- Rgroup were celebrating in August with optical microscopy, PhD Student Thomas terconnectivity on resting cell membranes. an important publication in PNAS. van Zanten and postdoc Carlo Manzo – to- Their findings constitute a step towards In their studies of the cell membrane, gether with collaborators from the Radboud a fuller understanding of the activation and where preorganised components give rise University Nijmegen Medical Center in the clustering of lipid raft constituents, which to strategic advantages for protein function Netherlands – perturbed the lipid raft na- amplify and strengthen pre-existing interac- and signalling, the Single Molecule Bio- nolandscape and visualised the formation of tions and mediate signal transduction across nanophotonics team were looking at lipid cholesterol-dependent GM1 nanodomains the cell membrane. // rafts – free-floating membrane regions of less than 120nm in size. Subsequent in silico proteins and lipids – and have now demon- experiments at the University of Barcelona van Zanten, T. S. et al, 2010, Direct mapping of strated their cholesterol-mediated selective and Co.S.Mo. Lab at the PCB contributed nanoscale compositional connectivity on intact connectivity at the nanoscale. to the high-resolution data that conclusively cell membranes, PNAS, 107, 15437-15442 INSIDEIBEC ı Issue 1 Winter 2010 ı 2 INSIDEIBEC ı Issue 1 Winter 2010 ı 3 BioNanoMed Catalunya launched IBEC-led alliance to bridge discipline gaps òrum Biocat on 2 December saw the range of disciplines need to cross bounda- Region, the ANH is the first collaborative Ffirst announcement of a new initiative ries and work together to translate research effort to bridge the gaps between medicine, in nanomedicine, BioNanoMed Catalunya, results and lab discoveries into viable medi- biology, materials science, computer tech- fostered by IBEC and the Catalan Biore- cal products and drugs,” explains IBEC’s nology and public policy to facilitate R&D gion agency, Biocat. The alliance aims to head of corporate projects Arantxa Sanz. in nanotechnology. bring together researchers, hospitals and “This alliance is a practical solution to over- The next step for BioNanoMed companies working in the region to share come these barriers by combining resources Catalunya will be in January 2011, when know-how and resources, facilitate new and expertise from multiple organizations the alliance website is launched. “With developments in nanomedicine and gain and making the results available to stake- BioNanoMed Catalunya, pharma and bio, international visibility for the advances in holders and the community. Alongside this, the field that are emerging in Catalonia. a consolidated network will be much more effective than isolated partners to contribute IBEC and Biocat have been working // “This alliance is a practical to aims very much needed for nanotech- solution to overcome barriers” together to develop the initiative since nology deployment, such as the setting December 2009. The other research centres up of a regulatory framework, standards initially involved include IDIBELL, with of best practice and professional training academia and industry, technologists, bio- a leading role from the biomedical side, programmes.” medical researchers, clinicians and patients as well as Hospital Clinic, Vall d’Hebron, BioNanoMed Catalunya uses as its advocates are uniting,” says Arantxa. “This ICIQ, ICFO, ICN, ICMAB, IQAC and model the Alliance for Nanohealth (ANH) is essential when the potential applications the technological centre LEITAT Biomed. in Houston, USA, which was founded in of nanotechnology in medicine include the On the industry side, the core partners will 2004. Comprising eight world-renowned most promising early diagnosis and targeted be Ferrer, Grupo Lipotec and Biokit. universities and institutions within the Tex- treatments for cancer and neurodegenera- “In nanomedicine, experts from a huge as Medical Center and the Greater Houston tive diseases.” // The third annual Fòrum Biocat, which took place on 2 December at Casa Llotja de Mar in Barcelona, brought What is Fòrum Biocat? together more than 700 industrial and academic representatives from the biotechnology, biomedicine and medical technology sectors in Catalonia with the aim of fostering collaborations. Organised with the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce, the annual forum includes keynote speeches, a programme of round table discussions, the award ceremony for the BioEmprenedorXXI programme – which recognises the best plan to start up an innovative company in the life sciences sector – and the naming of the Ambassador to the BioRegion, as well as plenty of opportunities for networking. IBECinPICTURES Since September, IBEC has hosted several (SEM), organised by group leader Antonio Juárez events to bring together scientists and and senior researcher Eduard Torrents along with collaborators from all over the world, beginning the University of Barcelona. The last major event with the meeting of the European project of the year to be hosted by IBEC was another Neurochem on 1 October, which is coordinated European Project meeting on 2-3 December for by Artificial Olfaction group leader Santiago AngioScaff (Angiogenesis-inducing Bioactive and Marco. Four days later on 5 October, more than Bioresponsive Scaffolds in Tissue Engineering). 60 researchers, medical professionals and IBEC director Josep Planell’s group and Damien company representatives came to IBEC for a Lacroix’s Biomechanics and Mechanobiology CIBER-BBN conference entitled Research and team are working on the design and development Development of Advanced Therapies. side of the project. In November, IBEC’s events continued with the 8th meeting of the Molecular Microbiology For a list of IBEC events at the beginning of group of the Sociedad Española de Microbiología 2011, turn to the back page. FEATURE IBEC in figures Publishing: IBEC Number of spin-off companies1 Number2 of ERC is ‘Yukon gold’ researchers Number of EU5 projects For a young institute, IBEC’s publication