Discovery Centre Opens in Dundee FEBS-EMBO Anniversary

Home , Catherine Dulac, David Ron, Edvard Moser, Gary Ruvkun

AUTUMN 2014

ISSUE 28

Discovery Centre FEBS-EMBO opens Anniversary in Dundee Conference

PAGE 13 PAGES 2 – 3 irgile Delâtre FEBS-EMBO JOINT ANNIVERSARY CONFERENCE ©V

The mental maps of bees

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Feature Members of the Polish EMBO Interview EMBO Member David Ron from Feature Behind the scenes of the European community present their research at the Cambridge Institute of Medical Research Union-funded BioMedBridges project which the BIO 2014 Congress in Warsaw. describes the benefts of agitation. is building infrastructure and a culture for shared data in the life sciences .

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www.embo.org THE FEBS–EMBO ANNIVERSARY 2014 CONFERENCE ©Virgile Delâtre

reveal about the incredible geographic migra- Highlights from the FEBS-EMBO tion of humans over the years. “Modern humans originated in Africa and began their migration to other parts of the world almost 100 000 to 125 000 Anniversary Conference in Paris years ago,” said Pääbo. His work, which involves painstaking analysis of often scarce amounts of he FEBS-EMBO Anniversary Conference of “Mr. FEBS” Satya Prakash Datta. Whelan first genetic material recovered from human bones in hosted by the French Society for proposed a journal for the rapid communication remote locations, has helped to build up a picture TBiochemistry and Molecular Biology of short reports in biochemistry, biophysics and of the influence of Neanderthals on the migration (SFBBM) took place in Paris from 30 August to 4 molecular biology in 1967. Datta played a key of humans out of Africa, through parts of Europe September. More than 2500 scientists from over role in establishing and running FEBS Letters and into Asia. Pääbo’s work on ancient DNA has 60 countries came together to listen to six excit- which went on to be very successful. At the meet- successfully distinguished at the genetic level ing days of talks from leading researchers in the ing, the EMBO and FEBS journals collaborated to what makes us different from our Neanderthal life sciences and to celebrate the joint anniversa- award prizes for the best posters of the day and cousins. His recent book “Neanderthal man: ries of EMBO, FEBS and the SFBBM. the winning posters were displayed in a special In search of lost genomes,” which comprises “I would like to extend a warm thank you to area of the conference. memoirs from his career, was recently published everyone who contributed to an outstanding In the opening scientific lectures, Catherine by Basic Books. anniversary meeting in Paris,” said Maria Leptin, Dulac from Harvard University and Svante Pääbo On the second day of the meeting, Thomas Director of EMBO. “It was a wonderful event that from the Max Planck institute for Evolutionary Stocker from the University of Bern gave a reflected both the excitement and excellence of Anthropology in Leipzig described their latest special plenary lecture on climate change. science in Europe. I am convinced that the rela- scientific work. Dulac’s talk focused on how “Climate change is the biggest challenge of the tionships we have established between our organ- the mouse brain is geared for social interaction. century,” commented EMBO Secretary General izations will serve us well in the years ahead.” She outlined the striking antagonistic interac- Sir Paul Nurse in his introduction to the talk. Marie-Christine Lemardeley from the Office tions in brain systems that underlie parental of the Mayor of Paris opened the meeting and care and infant-directed aggression in both male VIDEO remarked that she was particularly looking and female mice. Remarkably the mouse brain forward to the opening lecture by Svante Pääbo has the infrastructure to support male or female and the session on transparent publishing. After child-rearing characteristics. “Highly conserved welcoming remarks from EMBO, FEBS and circuits and modulatory mechanisms may exist SFBBM, Gottfried Schatz and William Whelan across species and in both male and female brains revealed the early histories and development to regulate parental interactions with offspring,” of EMBO and FEBS, respectively. “EMBO is said Dulac. The fine line that divides the differ- unashamedly elitist,” said Schatz. “It has never ences in mental processes in mice for what we joined the mania of big science. I hope its heart would call good and bad parenting is striking. Catherine Dulac Brain function and chromatin plasticity will beat vigorously for years to come.” William Dulac believes that studying these processes in Harvard University Professor Catherine Whelan, the first Secretary General of FEBS, has mice will help reveal the complexities of human Dulac talks about the role of histone, the been an active participant in the activities of parental behavior and its susceptibility to mental basis of memory, and the future of molecular FEBS since it took its first steps 50 years ago. illness. neurosciences. He emphasized the importance of the contribu- Svante Pääbo’s talk focused on the origins tions of the FEBS journals to the development of and evolution of humans. He described what new http://serious-science.org/videos/934 the society as well as the crucial contributions DNA sequencing technologies have been able to

2 EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] ©2014 EMBO THE FEBS–EMBO ANNIVERSARY 2014 CONFERENCE “The consequences for the planet are huge if oceans to see what a dramatic effect humans cancer and cardiovascular disease. Rapamycin we do not limit it.” Stocker described how the have had on the planet. There has been a huge received clinical approval in 1999 for use in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had change in energy content down to a depth of 2 prevention of organ rejection in kidney transplant put together their most recent assessment enti- km, almost 250 x 1021 Joules over the years 1970 patients. Torisel and Afinitor were approved in tled Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science to 2010. This is greater than the energy output 2007 and 2009, respectively, for the treatment of Basis. A four-year project with input from 259 of the world for a year.” Limiting climate change advanced kidney cancer. Hall went on to present scientists and approval from governments around will require substantial and sustained reductions a unified model for TOR signaling in genetics and the world, the report documents the evidence in greenhouse gas emissions. “There is no magic biochemistry. for human influence on the world’s climate. bullet to reduce emissions from fossil fuels,” said Other highlights at the meeting included a Warming of the climate system is unequivo- Stocker “but we have a choice.” plenary session on epigenetics. The session cal, say the contributors to the report, and it Michael Hall delivered the FEBS Sir Hans Krebs ended with talks from EMBO Members David is extremely likely that human influence is the Lecture describing the discovery of TOR (target Baulcombe, Wolf Reik and Susan Gasser. The dominant cause of the observed warming since of rapamycin) and its role in signaling events for FEBS-EMBO Anniversary Conference included 30 the mid-20th century. “One only has to look at growth and metabolism. Since its discovery in concurrent sessions that spanned the cell cycle, the change in the energy content of the world’s 1991, around 3000 papers have been published chromosome structure, cilia and disease, mito- in the scientific literature on TOR (2012 data). He chondria and mitochondrial disease, stem cells, went on to describe some of the applications that microbiology and synthetic biology. Four plenary have arisen from this work. Research on TOR sessions explored topics that included bioin- has resulted in drugs to prevent organ rejection formatics, genomics, epigenetics, the immune during transplantations and new ways to treat system, cell biology and systems biology.

Participants at the FEBS-EMBO anniversary conference in the Exhibition Hall in Paris ©Virgile Delâtre

design for the medal that we award to young The EMBO scientists for outstanding contributions to the life sciences in Europe.” The new design created by the EMBO graph- Gold Medal ic design team not only includes a fresh repre- SOPHIE MARTIN of the University sentation of the cell but also incorporates new elements that reﬂect, for example, the more of Lausanne, Switzerland, received quantitative aspects of molecular biology. the 2014 EMBO Gold Medal at Martin has been working for the past 15 the FEBS-EMBO Anniversary years to understand cellular polarity, in particular the way in which the spatial organization of

Conference in Paris. The medal cells contributes to cell size and cell division. ©Virgile Delâtre was awarded for her work to In the last 11 years, she has been using fission understand the molecular events yeast, which grow as single, rod-shaped cells, as a model system for her investigations. that define the organization and Martin and her team have revealed how development of the cell. gradients of specific control proteins at the extremities of the cell contribute to the control he Gold Medal has been redesigned for of cell growth and the ultimate size of the cell. TEMBO’s anniversary year. “2014 is the “I have always been fascinated by how perfect year to introduce a new look for the biological processes are spatially organized EMBO Gold Medal,” commented EMBO within cells. I feel incredibly lucky not only to Director Maria Leptin. “We wanted to mark the have the freedom to study this basic problem occasion of our 50th anniversary with a new but to be rewarded for it,” said Martin.

when studying diseases that affect different organ- Building bridges for isms in the same way: the effectiveness of possible treatments for human patients can be tested translational research on mouse models. But biologists working with mouse models and clinicians use different terms Behind the scenes, a European Union-funded project is ironing out to describe symptoms in mice and humans, so important details to help scientists translate basic research into solutions it can be difﬁcult to relate them to each other – for example, “hyper- glycemia” in a human is described as “increased circulating blood glucose“ in mice even though they are exactly the same thing. BioMedBridges is working to reconcile the vocabular- ies used in diabetes and obesity research, effec- tively translating between species and making research faster and more efﬁcient. With hundreds of millions of people suffer- ing from these diseases, the importance of this work is obvious. Biological and medical imaging is another area

Janet Thornton, where BioMedBridges can Director of the European Bioinformatics Institute help accelerate discovery. ioMedBridges Researchers and techni- ©B cal staff in the project are he gap between curiosity-driven, basic With so many fields coming together, developing tools that make it possible to “zoom” research and application-driven research BioMedBridges has put a lot of effort into opening between images created on different scales, from Tis a long-standing challenge in the life up communication channels between the people a single cell via tissues to whole organisms. sciences. Basic research generates valuable behind the data, who work in many groups scat- Ultimately, this will enable linking certain pheno- new ideas that help scientists approach tough tered throughout Europe. types to genomic information, making it possible problems in new ways. But there is a long road “Some of these groups were looking at data to identify potential disease biomarkers and drug between a bright idea and the development of a interoperability from an expert level and others targets. new medicine or crop, and the journey is made were just getting to grips with the fact that “Our goal is to help researchers make maxi- even longer by technical stumbling blocks. Even this can be a challenge,” says Janet Thornton, mum use of the vast data resources available to the seemingly simple process of sharing different Director of the European Molecular Biology them, in whichever life-science discipline they kinds of data can be frustrating, as researchers Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute may work,” says Thornton. from diverse communities often describe things and BioMedBridges coordinator. “One of the The project outcomes will be launched at an in very different ways. greatest achievements of the project so far is open conference, to be held on the Wellcome Trust The BioMedBridges project is building a that we have an active and engaged network of Genome Campus in Hinxton on 17-19 November shared data culture in the life sciences, finding technical staff from all 12 infrastructures who are 2015. Everyone from the biological and biomedi- technical solutions to the flow of information starting to speak the same language with respect cal data community is welcome to attend. from basic research into medical and environ- to data interoperability. This is a very important mental applications. Funded by the European step, because it means we can lay a strong foun- Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme dation for uniting biomedical resources.” (2012 to 2016), the project’s partners are link- BioMedBridges takes on fiddly problems and ing up 12 of Europe’s new biological, biomedi- rationalises them. Research data starts with cal and environmental research infrastructures. the output coming from some instrument and BioMedBridges is digging deep into the details gains meaning when information is added to it. of biological data to make data-driven research Each discipline has its own standard methods easier and more transparent for scientists work- for doing this. However, techniques constantly ing in life-science research and development, and evolve, research questions change and separate for the many patients who have volunteered their disciplines begin to interact. BioMedBridges information. is developing and implementing shared stand- The central principle driving BioMedBridges ards and semantic web technologies, which are is the development of necessary infrastructure designed to connect disparate data sources – this to enable the use of data from publicly funded is pioneering work for life science data. research in new and different contexts, includ- How does BioMedBridges work in practice? ing data from genomics, biological and medi- One example might be diabetes and obesity cal imaging, structural biology, mouse disease research. To find what role a gene plays in an models, clinical trials, highly contagious agents organism, researchers can “switch it off” and see For more information see: and chemical biology, to name just a few. what happens. This is a powerful tool, particularly www.biomedbridges.eu/

Members of the Polish EMBO community presented their research at the in Poland. Since 2011, up to five EMBO | ESF BIO 2014 Congress in Warsaw Symposia funded by EMBO and the European Science Foundation have been held in Poland, oland joined the EMBC – the intergovern- about knots in proteins. This relatively new field – each of them attracting around 600 scientists mental funding body of EMBO – in 1999. A knots in proteins were not discovered until 1994 – from all over the world. Yet these conferences are few years later the very first Polish EMBO is still understudied. “Knots are conserved across organized mainly by foreign researchers and not P · Member, Maciej Zylicz, encouraged the creation life, from bacteria to humans. They are doing necessarily by Polish scientists. “We would like of the EMBO Installation Grants – a scheme to something very important,” said the biophysicist. to encourage Polish scientists to run more confer- bring talented scientists to countries experiencing The major challenge of working with knotted ences in Poland,” stated Wallon. The same goes an exodus of scientific talent. Since its inception, proteins experimentally is to distinguish between for fellowship applications where EMBO would 13 researchers have been granted extra money knotted and unknotted topology, yet this can be like to see an increase in the numbers of applica- and support to establish independent research solved theoretically. The current goal is to under- tions from Poland for Long-Term and Short-Term groups in Poland. The scheme is important for stand the function of knots in proteins. Almost Fellowships. Poland as the country has struggled with both all knotted globular proteins discovered so far The dialogue will continue in 2015 when funding shortages and loss of researchers over are enzymes responsible for metabolic processes. the annual Young Scientists Forum will come to the last decades. Since then, Poland has taken Some forms may play a role in infectious diseas- Warsaw next May. a number of measures, including the found- es – an angle that Sulkowska and colleagues are ing of the Polish Science Foundation (FNP) and actively exploring now. the National Science Centre (NCN), to provide Tomasz Wilanowski – a 2011 Installation research grants for their scientists. Grantee – gave a well-received talk on the new A recent international life science conference roles of the Grainyhead-like (GRHL) family of in Warsaw gave scientists working in Poland an transcription factors in cancer. He set the foun- opportunity to present their latest research and dation for his research during his stay at the recent developments. The BIO 2014 Congress Australian National University and later the was the first joint meeting of the largest Polish Royal Melbourne Hospital in Australia before societies in the area of life sciences. It took place coming back to Poland. His goal is to optimize on the University of Warsaw campus from 9-12 cancer therapies on the basis of GRHL patterns in September. The session “EMBO and Poland” was tumours. “We have very many anti-cancer drugs. an important part of the four-day conference. The issue is which one works in a particular Organized by EMBO Council Member Leszek patient in a particular tumour.” Kaczmarek, the session included more than a Leszek Kaczmarek, current head of the EMBO dozen lectures by Members, present and former Installation Grant Committee, gave a talk entitled Leszek Young Investigators and Installation Grantees – a Molecular biology of mind. Maciej Z·ylicz spoke Kaczmarek, forum revealing the fruitful dialogue between about Chaperoning the guardian. Lessons from current head EMBO and Poland that has continually grown tumours. of the EMBO Installation over the last fifteen years. Concluding the two-day session, EMBO Grant The 2014 Installation Grantee Joanna Installation Grant Programme Manager Gerlind Committee olker Wiersdorff

Sułkowska from the University of Warsaw spoke Wallon gave an overview of EMBO activities ©V

Finding the right path RANDOLF MENZEL is Professor Emeritus of Neurobiology at the Free University of Berlin in Germany. Since he ﬁrst started investigating insects almost 50 years ago, Professor Menzel has studied how honeybees learn colours, how their memory is organized, and how memory is implemented in the neural network of the bee brain. More recently he has been looking at how bees navigate to different locations and how they communicate about locations. Here he discusses his

recent paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences about a proof for the existence of mental maps in honeybees.1 andolf Menzel ©R

What got you started in studying the way environment are integrated to organize navi- system, a harmonic radar, that tracks them over honeybees “think” and behave? gation. Neuroscientists have good reasons to 1–2 km. The bee has to be equipped with a tran- One of the questions that motivated me to believe that mammals, for example the laboratory sponder, a passive radar antenna that weighs 20 study biology, chemistry and physics at univer- rat, navigate by a map-like representation of the mg and measures 12 mm in length. It can easily sity was how animals with rather small brains explored environment – a cognitive map in the be carried by a bee and does not disturb its flight. like worms, crustaceans and insects learn and hippocampus of the brain. Such forms of memory The data are highly informative, but the method use memory for adapting their behavior to the about the environment store the spatial relations is not easy because the harmonic radar is a sensi- conditions of a changing world. At high school, of landmarks and the meaning of locations for tive device that is exposed to the rough condi- I observed plankton under the microscope. Tiny behavioral control. Behavioral biologists find it tions of the environment, for example rain, strong little animals, rotifers, which belong to the group difficult to accept the concept of a cognitive map wind, thunderstorms. I would not have been able of nematodes, particularly impressed me. They because they believe that the same behavioral to collect such data if I had not had the luck to have a clear glass body, and I could see their eyes, phenomena can be explained by multiple and collaborate with Uwe Greggers, a highly gifted muscles and brain under a microscope when they separate sensory-motor routines. Since there is engineer, for more than 40 years. maneuvered through the water. My first scientific no neural correlate of navigation in insects it is publication describes the ecology of a fresh water rather difficult to prove the necessity or existence pond close to my hometown on the Rhine River. of a cognitive map in insects. I define a mental or “Navigation according to a mental Martin Lindauer, a Professor at the University cognitive map as a memory structure that stores map has been considered to be the of Frankfurt and a co-worker of Karl von Frisch, spatial and temporal relations of landmarks in accepted me as a graduate student without any such a way that behavioral routines like expecta- realm of big brains.” exams, and allowed me to address the question of tion, planning and travel shortcuts are possible. how bees learn colours. Martin Lindauer was an Shortcutting is the essential proof of a metric enthusiastic zoologist. He continued to do experimental map, because it requires self-localiza- You reported your recent results in mental work even when he had to run the zoolo- tion and goal localization if other, more simple Proceedings of the National Academy of gy department. He and Franz Huber, an inspiring mechanisms, like steering towards a beacon or Sciences. Have you been surprised by the Professor at the University of Tübingen, were role matching with the panorama, can be excluded. interest in the paper? models for me throughout my academic career. I view the mental map of animals, including the Bees are small animals with a small brain. honeybee, as an action memory of spatial rela- Navigation according to a mental map has tions rather than a sensory representation as been considered to be the realm of big brains. “Behavioral biologists find it we humans experience by introspection. Action Documenting a mental map for navigation in difficult to accept the concept of means not only expressed motor behavior but bees comes as a surprise for some and arouses also “internal doing” or “thinking” that leads to skepticism and opposition. We had proposed the a cognitive map because they expectation and planning. existence of a mental map in bees earlier as one 2 believe that the same behavioral of several mechanisms of their navigation. This Do we know what type of molecular or interpretation was met with skepticism and alter- phenomena can be explained by cellular events underlie the formation of a native interpretations were published. We there- multiple and separate sensory- mental map in an insect’s brain? fore searched for experimental approaches that Unfortunately no. Together with my co-work- could decide between alternative interpretations. motor routines.” ers we are working hard to search for neural correlates in the honeybee brain that code for Some researchers say bees can navigate spatial relations of objects that possibly control without a mental map and that your study One of your recent projects is bee navigation navigation. does not exclude this possibility. What is the and how it depends on mental maps. How do reasoning and how do you respond to this? you defne a mental map? On a practical note, how diffcult is it to track We documented in earlier publications that Animals, including humans, use many sens- the fight paths of bees? bees are able to perform shortcutting flights thus es and many behavioral strategies to navigate Navigation cannot be studied in the lab or in fulfilling the requirement of a mental map if more from one place to the next. Both innate mech- the vicinity of the hive or a feeding place. In my elementary solutions could be excluded. One anisms and acquired information about the view, the large amount of data collected under elementary solution of shortcutting could not be world are used for navigation. The question for such restricted conditions are rather irrelevant excluded in our former studies which is discussed behavioral biologists and neuroscientists is how for navigational studies. Bees cover distances in an earlier paper.3 It was therefore helpful that these various forms of information about the of kilometers. Therefore, we use a special radar Cruse and Wehner pointed out that bees could

6 EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] ©2014 EMBO INTERVIEW solve the kind of shortcutting we demonstrated about locations with a symbolic form of infor- multiple sensory modalities involved in naviga- by an algorithmic procedure, namely vector addi- mation transfer – the waggle dance. Relating tion and the high order control of behavioral tion of two stored vectors.4 waggle dance communication and navigation has acts is already quite well known. Insects are too The essence of the argument put forward allowed us to postulate that they refer to the same small to mount amplifiers and wireless transmit- by Cruse and Wehner was that the directional kind of spatial memory in their own navigation ting electronic units on their body. We recently component of the respective vectors is related and in their dance communication.3 Further stud- succeeded to record multiple high order interneu- to the sun compass. We therefore searched for a ies will help us to test whether they make deci- rons in the bee brain when the animal is freely method that allows us to shift the sun compass. sions about the value of the dance-indicated goal moving within a colony. We also found it possi- We found a solution by anesthetizing the animals based on their own experience with that goal. ble to record from such neurons when walking for six hours, which is a long time. This stops bumble bees navigate in a small maze. I say their inner clock, which in turns leads to a shift It is true that there is a distinct difference navigate but this kind of navigation in such a between the way ants, for example, navigate maze is rather simple. It is close to the condi- on the ground and bees navigate in fight? tions rats are tested when their hippocampus is “I view the mental map of Indeed there is a distinct difference between recorded. These experiments are a beginning. We animals, including the honeybee, earth bound animals like ants and airborne are confident we shall find ways to record high animals like bees as they experience and use order interneurons in the bee brain even when as an action memory of spatial spatial information about the environment. Ants they fly and explore the environment. relations rather than a sensory see the panorama as a 360° circle of skyline profile, bees experience the ground structure as representation as we humans a geometric map at the outset combining these experience by introspection.” sequentially experienced maps to an integrated map. Generalizing from ants to bees appears to me as inappropriate. in their sun compass. We found that these time- shifted animals initially fly in the wrong direction. Science is often more about differences in In this case, further to the east because the inner opinion that many people think and it is clock gave them an earlier time. However they important to reach a consensus. What is the returned home as fast as the control bees that best way to do this? had not had their internal clocks shifted in time.1 Disagreement is a highly productive resource Since we excluded more elementary solutions in science and should not be considered as a we concluded that the bees referred to a repre- nuisance. The opinion of the minority can open sentation of the ground structure equivalent to a the field to significant new discoveries and fundamental map. This conclusion was questioned on mentally new directions. Science is not about andolf Menzel two grounds: First, bees may have adjusted their democratic consensus building. Experimental ©R inner clock within minutes during the vector evidence and conclusive arguments are the back- Honeybee with a transponder for and search flights, and second bees may have bone of science. The controversy about the mental harmonic radar tracking referred to the skyline of the panorama.5 Both of map in the bee is an intense debate going on right these suggestions can be rebutted because adjust- now in behavioral biology and neuroscience. ment of the time shift after 6 hours of anesthesia REFERENCES requires days and the angular modulation of the 1. Cheeseman et al. (2014) Way-fnding in displaced clock- shifted bees proves bees use a cognitive map. Proceedings skyline was below a 2° visual angle in the test “Disagreement is a highly area. Bees do not have a spatial resolution by of the National Academy of Sciences USA 111(24): 8949–8954. their compound eye better than a 2° visual angle. productive resource in science 2. Menzel et al. (2005) Honey bees navigate according to An improvement of spatial resolution as suggest- and should not be considered a map-like spatial memory. Proceedings of the National ed by Cheung and co-workers, namely a modula- Academy of Sciences USA 102(8): 3040–3045. tion of the brightness received by a single omma- as a nuisance.” 3. Menzel et al. (2011) A common frame of reference for tidium, a single visual pixel in the compound learned and communicated vectors in honeybee naviga- eye, has not been shown in any insect and is not tion (2011) Current Biology 21(8): 645–650. supported by any experimental evidence in the Traditional behavioral biology tends to ignore the 4. Cruse H and Wehner R (2011) No need for a cognitive map: decentralized memory for insect navigation. honeybee.5 We therefore maintain our conclu- richness of even small brains and tries to avoid PLoS Computational Biology 7(3): e1002009. sion that vector addition is excluded as a possible making any assumptions about their capacity to 5. Cheung et al. (2014) Still no convincing evidence mechanism for homing in these experiments. probe the potential outcomes of future behav- for cognitive map use by honeybees. Proceedings of ioral actions. This “inner doing” is at the realm the National Academy of Sciences USA. doi: 10.1073/ Is it a bold statement to say that your of neuroscience. In this sense, neuroscience has pnas.1413581111: . experiments prove the use of mental maps followed the cognitive turn much more radically in bees? than behavioral biology. My thinking is governed There are two components to the concept of a by both disciplines but I notice that behavioral mental map: the relational representation of land- biology lags behind evidence and sticks to tradi- marks and the meaning of locations to the animal. tional concepts that become increasingly irrel- Indeed, we believe that we have documented evant when we ask how the brain performs all beyond doubt that bees refer in their navigation these wonderful tasks. to a metric representation of the environment. However, we have only little evidence that they You plan to do experiments with bees in assign meaning to the experienced locations. It mazes. What will this show? will be a topic of further research to address this We need to find neural correlates of navigation question and honeybees provide us with the in insects. There is no hippocampus in insects opportunity for an answer. Bees communicate but the necessary convergence site between the

The Centre for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona, Spain, has joined forces CRG are working to develop data-mining and with the European Bioinformatics Institute in the United Kingdom to further federated-access tools that will vastly improve the utility of the information on offer. develop the European Genome-phenome Archive (www.ebi.ac.uk/ega), a The EGA contains data from around 300,000 large-scale repository for biomedical research data initially launched by individuals, so ensuring data privacy is para- EMBL-EBI in 2008. Through the ELIXIR data infrastructure, this secure, mount. The information in the archive comes from individuals who consent to the sharing of public resource of human genotype and phenotype data is now more their data, but with an understanding that the sustainable and able to meet the rapidly growing needs of the scientiﬁc data will only be made available to bona ﬁde community thanks to a formal agreement between the two institutes. researchers for research projects that meet appro- priate data use policies. Future developments will streamline the data-access application process, which will continue to ensure data privacy while reducing frustration.

A growing archive The EGA currently stores around 1100 terabytes of data, generated by more than 700 scientific studies on cancer, diabetes, autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular problems and neurological disorders, amongst other illnesses. Researchers from over 200 organisations have submitted their data, and with the increasingly rapid uptake of sequencing technologies, many more are expect- ed to contribute. Scientists who are granted permission can download specific datasets for re-analysis. These bra Social “la Caixa” data might represent experimental investigations ©O From left to Right: Arcadi Navarro Affliate Head of the EGA team; Jaime Lanaspa Director General of the of a particular trait or disease, for example inflam- “la Caixa” Foundation; Andreu Mas-Colell Minister of Economy and Knowledge from the Government of Catalonia; matory bowel disease, hypertension or rheuma- Carmen Vela Secretary of State for Research & Development from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and toid arthritis. The wealth of information in the Competitiveness; Luis Serrano, Director of the CRG; and Francesc Subirada, Associate Director of the Barcelona EGA can potentially be used to inform the design Supercomputing Center. of therapeutic interventions for a wide range of diseases and conditions. s its defining feature, the EGA provides array-based technologies, paired with pheno- a means for sensitive, individual-level typic or clinically derived data. It supports pre- Support Ahuman biomedical data to be made publication data release in accordance with the Supported by two ELIXIR pilot projects (www. available through a secure channel to bona fide Toronto agreement, which endorses the value of elixir-europe.org), both the extension of the EGA researchers. Researchers gain access through a rapid prepublication data release for large refer- as a collaboration between EMBL-EBI and the data request process, ensuring that the security ence data sets that have broad utility in biology development of federated access to the data aim and research use requirements for data are met. and medicine. to ensure the long-term availability of genomic Working together, the CRG and EMBL-EBI “The EGA adds enormous value to Barcelona’s and phenomic data in the public domain. La teams provide the EGA service to data submit- already exceptional genomics and health research Obra Social “la Caixa,” the Government of ters, which range from large global consortium cluster,” says Luis Serrano, EMBO Member and Catalonia and the Spanish Ministry of Economy projects to individual research groups. The EGA director of the CRG. “In a very important way, and Competitiveness (through the “Centre of provides an effective way for submitters to meet the EGA is an excellent example of how a range Excellence Severo Ochoa” programme), the the long-term archiving and data dissemination of different national institutes can join forces to Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS), policies often required by funding agencies and reach a common goal.” and the National Institute of Bioinformatics publishers, and a means to increase the impact of “The EGA provides a foundational resource for (INB-ISCIII) provided support for the EGA at their research through collaboration. biomedical research, enabling the secure shar- the CRG. The Wellcome Trust, the European Users of the EGA are able to discover and ing of data that has been collected to further our Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme, access datasets relevant to their research. Both understanding of numerous diseases. The knowl- the UK Medical Research Council and the EGA submitters and users benefit from the new, edge gained by further analyses of these data European Molecular Biology Laboratory have larger, combined EGA team. It will distribute the will help shape clinical applications of genom- provided support to the European Bioinformatics workload, offer a larger help-desk and training ics across Europe and beyond,” says Paul Flicek, Institute (EMBL-EBI). team, and develop new services such as secure, head of genes, genomes and variation resources interactive browsing of EGA datasets. at EMBL-EBI.

Clinical data in the public domain Simplifying access The EGA accepts data from sequencing, genotyp- The EGA is a controlled-access resource that The EGA project is made available through ing, transcriptome or epigenetics experiments strives to help scientists use the information it the following EMBL-EBI and CRG-based web using next-generation sequencing platforms or contains to maximum effect. EMBL-EBI and the portals: www.ebi.ac.uk/ega and ega.crg.eu

article-processing charges or licensing more value-added journal content could also gener- Focus on Science Policy ate additional revenue for journals that could be used to support the activities of societies. It is not Scientifc societies and the clear if any of these alternatives are sustainable. Most discussions about how to transition to Open Access have focused on funders and Open Access debate researchers. “Little attention has been directed to scientific societies when Open Access publishing The Initiative for Science in Europe (ISE) has finalized a paper that is discussed,” says Wolfgang Eppenschwandtner, describes the situation of scientific societies that publish journals in ISE Executive Coordinator. “One of our main the context of the transition to Open Access publishing. The paper, goals for the report was therefore to provide information on the role that journal publishing which was approved by the ISE General Assembly on 10 April 2014, has for scientific societies and their activities.” was prepared by Michele Garfinkel, EMBO Science Policy Manager, Very few individual journals have undergone with contributions from the ISE Open Access working group. EMBO has a successful changeover to full Open Access publishing but more journals are trying. EMBO been a member of ISE since 2004. The document is based on the input Molecular Medicine made a successful transition from 19 European learned societies, federations and other organizations to fully open access publishing in 2012. The Royal that collectively represent a community of at least 330 000 individual Society is placing its bets on Royal Society Open Science which will be their first journal to cover researchers. The purpose of the report is not to make recommendations the entire range of science and mathematics. but to provide information on the role that journal publishing has for scientific societies and their activities. About the Initiative for Science in Europe The Initiative for Science in Europe (ISE) is an independent platform of European learned soci- he origins of the Open Access movement fellowships, start-up grants, workshops, meetings, eties and scientific organizations whose aim is go back to discussions in the early 2000s. travel grants and childcare support. Since the to promote mechanisms to support all fields of TIn 2001, an official statement was released transition to Open Access can entail a decrease science at a European level, involve scientists from a meeting held in Hungary calling for all in revenue these groups face a dilemma: how in the design and implementation of European scientific papers to be made freely available to to continue providing the same level of services science policies, and to advocate strong independ- readers and users. Since the Budapest Declaration, to their communities. The report highlights a ent scientific advice in European policy making. different solutions have been pursued in the hope few options including introducing or increasing The ISE paper “Learned societies, academic of improving access to the research literature as membership fees, raising charges for attend- publishing, and transitions to Open Access” can well as its utility. This has included the launch ing meetings, or securing direct support from be downloaded at www.i-se.org/pdf/learned_soci- of new journals that rely on article-processing governmental or non-profit agencies. Increasing eties_academic_publishing_and_transitions.pdf charges in their efforts to achieve financial sustainability. The new report from ISE focuses attention on scientific societies, many of which are involved in scientific publishing. These organizations often use revenue generated from their journals to support activities that they provide for the benefit of the scientific community, for example

BOOK REVIEW

published in leading international journals. much broader Solving Arrival of the fittest is his first book popular- than a handful izing the new evolutionary systems research. of specialists,” evolution’s The recently published book, which is at says the author. the intersection of science and general interest, “I wanted read- greatest puzzle offers a new view on the structure of evolu- ers to be able tion. While Darwin’s theory is still power- to share in the radical departure from the mainstream ful in explaining how useful adaptations are excitement and Aperspective on Darwinian evolution,” preserved over generations, Wagner goes one the discoveries says Swiss author Rolf Dobelli on Andreas step further in trying to reveal how adaptations that are still to Wagner’s book Arrival of the fittest. “Wagner are not just driven by chance. Using experi- be made in the otherwise mature field of evolu- cuts to the core of innovation in living systems. mental and computational technologies, he tionary biology.” He added: “It was a daunting Fundamental. Entertaining. Brilliant.” explains, for example, how useful adaptations experience – much harder than any technical Andreas Wagner is a professor in the Institute arise in the first place. writing I have ever done.” of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental “The main motivation to write this book The book is published by Oneworld and is Studies at the University of Zurich. He is the was to present a number of potentially revolu- available from 6 November. The US edition is author of more than 150 scientific papers tionary insights into evolution to an audience available on 2 October from Current (Penguin).

Dr Jackie Hunter, Chief Executive and Deputy Chair of the BBSRC,

University University of Nottingham offcially opened the Hounsfeld Facility at the University of Nottingham ©

the thin layer of soil directly influenced by the Speaking at the meeting, Dr. Jackie Hunter, Uncovering the proteins and sugars released by roots and inhabit- remarked: “The Hounsfield Facility is set to play ed by the bacteria that live off discarded plant cells. a key role developing crops with improved root The team of scientists at Nottingham University architecture and underpinning research efforts to hidden half of will use the microCT equipment and novel image ensure global food security. Research carried out analysis techniques to understand how roots of at the new Hounsfield facility is truly interdisci- plants different crop varieties take up water and nitro- plinary, involving plant, crop and soil scientists gen. These facilities have enabled Professor with engineers, mathematicians and computer new centre for advanced imaging tech- Bennett’s team to observe that the distribution of scientists. Equipped with robots, microCT scan- nologies, a resource that promises to water in soil profoundly influences root branch- ners and specialised image analysis methods A allow scientists to design better root ing, revealing that new lateral roots form on the developed in-house, Nottingham researchers can systems for plants, was recently opened at the side of roots in contact with water, but rarely on now image root architecture in a non-destructive University of Nottingham, England. Dr. Jackie a dry side. In collaboration with US researcher way throughout the life cycle of the plant, from Hunter CBE, chief executive and deputy chair Jose Dinneny, Professor Bennett’s team reported seed to flowering, across a range of different soil of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences that this response in roots is regulated by a novel environments, for the very first time.” Research Council (BBSRC), officially launched hormone-based mechanism termed ‘hydropat- the Hounsfield Facility, named in honour of terning’. 1 Lateral root hydropat- the Nottinghamshire born Nobel Prize-winning terning occurs in both dicot inventor of X-ray microcomputed tomogra- and monocot species and phy (microCT), Sir Godfrey Hounsfield, on 18 therefore appears to be a high- September at the University’s Sutton Bonington ly conserved adaptive trait in Campus. The 5-million Euro state-of-the-art imag- land plants. ing centre, which provides access to the most The new facility is equipped advanced microCT scanners in the world, is fund- with three microCT scanners ed by the European Research Council, the BBSRC, capable of imaging objects as the Wolfson Foundation and the University of fine as a soil particle and root Nottingham. hairs to entire root systems: The new Hounsfield Facility is being launched A small high-resolution scan- to address one of the biggest global challenges, ner is available for visualizing namely food security. “For the first time in 10 fine details such as single roots, 000 years of plant breeding, we can non-inva- root hairs and the soil around The Hounsfeld Facility sively image root architecture directly in the them; a medium-scale microCT soil and then use this information to select the scanner can image whole roots; a large custom- REFERENCES most efficient varieties for farmers to grow,” says designed microCT system can be used to look 1. Bao et al. (2014) Plant roots use a patterning mechanism EMBO Member Malcolm Bennett, Professor of at large plants such as wheat from seedling to to position lateral root branches toward available water. Plant Sciences at the University of Nottingham flowering stages. In addition, a fully automated Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 111: 9319–9324. and Director of the Centre for Plant Integrative greenhouse is equipped with a laser-guided robot Further information is available from Professor Biology. that feeds the 1-metre-long, 80-kg samples to the Malcolm Bennett Malcolm.bennett@notting- The new imaging facility will allow the largest scanner. ham.ac.uk researchers to delve in detail into the rhizosphere,

The benefts of agitation Endocrinologist by education, DAVID RON switched to basic research during his postdoctoral training – and has stuck to it ever since. His laboratory at the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research focuses on the regulation of protein folding homeostasis in the endoplasmic reticulum. More recently, Ron has examined the emerging links between protein folding homeostasis and metabolism. This year he was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society.

Why is it important to study the unfolded Boston, in a laboratory that acknowledged physi- protein response and metabolic disorders? ological relevance but also encouraged funda- The mechanisms that cells use to monitor mental inquiry. I identified CHOP during my protein folding homeostasis and to respond to postdoctoral training in an effort to find transcrip- perturbations are intriguing. Unifying features tion factors relevant to adipose tissue differentia- conserved across phyla and compartments of tion. The first discovery of my own laboratory at the cell have been revealed, such as the ability New York University was of CHOP’s involvement of chaperones to attenuate the unfolded protein in the development of liposarcoma, a tumour signal. Remarkable diversity and natural inven- of adipose tissue. At the time, I had hoped that tiveness have been unearthed. In the secretory further digging into the function of CHOP and the pathway, maintaining conditions that favour Translocated in Sarcoma-CHOP fusion protein protein folding is especially challenging. The would unearth important clues about adipose Cambridge Institute for Medical Research premium on evolution of a robust unfolded tissue differentiation and more generally about © protein response has been large. oncogenesis. But over time I realised that there Unfolded protein stress in the endoplasmic are many roads to cancer. We were rescued from Society, means a great deal to me. The Royal reticulum and the cell’s response to it have perva- this frustratingly unproductive line of research Society of London for Improving Natural sive consequences and affect important biological by Xiaozhong’s work on CHOP as a target gene Knowledge was one of the first learned soci- processes such as ageing, memory and cognition, of the unfolded protein response and have stuck eties, an early product of the age of enlighten- inflammation, oncogenesis and – of particular with the latter problem ever since. ment. But there is a great deal that remains to interest to me as an endocrinologist – metabolism. be improved today and the importance of the Are you also planning to focus on protein Society in promoting conditions conducive to What inspired you to go into this type of folding in the future? the acquisition of knowledge is undiminished in research? I was born in 1955 so I am only concerned our times. Eternal vigilance is required to sustain Having trained in clinical medicine, I stum- with a limited portion of the cosmic future. public support for the scientific enterprise and I bled into research. When I set up my own lab in Therefore we shall likely stick with the study of am pleased to have any role, even a small one, in 1992, I had planned to follow-up on a transcrip- protein folding homeostasis for the duration of organizations like the Royal Society and EMBO tion factor called CHOP/Ddit3 that I had identi- my tenure. What may change are the tools we that take that job seriously. fied as a postdoctoral researcher. I hoped that its use. For example, since moving to Cambridge study would lead to the discovery of important our laboratory has embarked on structural and disease mechanisms. This hope was only partial- biophysical studies of unfolded protein response ly realised. It turned out, however, that CHOP is components. It is something I enjoy and I hope remarkably inducible by stress. This was in the we shall do more in this area. middle of the 1990s and endoplasmic reticulum stress was not unambiguously differentiated from What are the advantages and the drawbacks other types of stress such as genotoxic stress of being a scientist today? or oxidative stress. It was the discovery by my The drawback of being a scientist is the diffi- student, XiaoZhong (Alec) Wang, who is now culty to reconcile two conflicting personal attrib- at Northwestern University, of CHOP induction utes: to be irrationally optimistic whilst working during endoplasmic reticulum stress that kindled on a problem, believing despite all the lessons of VIDEO my interest in the underlying molecular mecha- the past that the next attempt will be informa- nisms. This work was a collaboration with Linda tive; and at the same time to be brutally realistic Hendershot from St. Jude Children’s Research in appreciating that, like all previous attempts, Hospital. I have been following up on this ques- this one too may fail. Henry Thoreau noted that tion ever since. the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. But the hope of discovery agitates the scientists’ How has the focus of your research changed desperation. That, I believe, is the advantage of throughout your career? being one. David Ron I set off doing non-redundant clinical research. The Unfolded Protein Response With time I realised that unless one has a pipe- What does it mean to you to become a Fellow David Ron discusses protein unfolding and line of unique clinical material or unnatural of the Royal Society? metabolic disorders for the Association of Cell insight, restricting research to mysterious clini- The meaning of having an honour bestowed Biology and Differentiation cal phenomena might limit the range of possi- upon one is inversely proportional to how ble discovery. So I chose to do my postdoctoral deserving one feels of that honour. By that www.youtube.com/watch?v=09zP4eTusUo research at the Massachusetts General Hospital in token, having been made a Fellow of the Royal

©2014 EMBO EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] 11 EMBO EVENTS | OCTOBER 2014 – NOVEMBER 2015 Practical Courses Conferences EMBO | EMBL Symposia EMBO Press Metabolomics bioinformatics for life From functional genomics to systems Frontiers in stem cells and cancer scientists biology DE-Heidelberg, 29–31 March 2015 Poster Prize winners UK-Cambridge, 16–20 February 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 8–11 November 2014 Cellular heterogeneity: Role of In vivo plant imaging Mechanisms and regulation of variability and noise in biological Congratulations to DE-Heidelberg, 9–15 March 2015 protein translocation decision-making the following winner: HR-Dubrovnik, 21–25 March 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 15–18 April 2015 Single molecule and single cell fuorescence Å/nm/µ/mm-scopy Chromatin and epigenetics Mechanisms of neurodegeneration DE-Heidelberg, 15–23 March 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 6–10 May 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 14–17 June 2015 THE EMBO JOURNAL

The characterization of post- RNA localization and local translation Enabling technologies for eukaryotic Vladimir Joukov translational modifcations GR-Hersonissos, 28 June–3 July 2015 synthetic biology Harvard Medical School, Boston, DK-Odense, 9–15 April 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 21–23 June 2015 United States DNA replication, chromosome The Cep192-organized Aurora A-Plk1 Computational biology: segregation and cell division The mobile genome: Genetic and cascade is essential for centrosome From genomes to systems UK-Egham, 27–31 July 2015 physiological impacts of transposable cycle and bipolar spindle assembly JP-Okinawa, 17–22 April 2015 elements Ribosome synthesis DE-Heidelberg, 16–19 September 2015 Presented at the FEBS-EMBO joint Small angle neutron and X-ray BE-Brussels, 19–23 August 2015 anniversary conference in Paris, France scattering from proteins in solution Seeing is believing FR-Grenoble, 18–22 May 2015 Meiosis DE-Heidelberg, 7–10 October 2015 EMBO REPORTS UK-Oxford, 30 August–4 September 2015 Advanced electron microscopy for New approaches and concepts in Nicholas R. Y. Lim cell biology Autophagy signalling and progression microbiology University of Melbourne, Australia in health and disease FR-Bordeaux, 8–19 June 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 11–14 October 2015 Regulation of WD40 Repeat Protein IT-Chia, 9–12 September 2015 62 by Aurora A – insights into the Synthetic biology in action The non-coding genome maintenance of the mitotic spindle DE-Heidelberg, 8–20 June 2015 Ubiquitin and ubiquitin-like DE-Heidelberg, 18–21 October 2015 modifers: From molecular Presented at the FEBS-EMBO joint Developmental neurobiology: mechanisms to human diseases Biological oscillators: Design, anniversary conference in Paris, France From worms to mammals HR-Cavtat, 18–22 September 2015 mechanism, function UK-London, 21 June–4 July 2015 DE-Heidelberg, 12–14 November 2015 MOLECULAR SYSTEMS BIOLOGY The multidisciplinary era of endocytic Image processing for cryoelectron mechanics and functions … Mohammad Fallahi-Sichani microscopy FR-Mandelieu-la-Napoule, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States UK-London, 1–11 September 2015 27 September–2 October 2015 EMBO Global Exchange Systematic characterisation of Current methods in cell biology … Lecture Courses drug-induced adaptive responses in DE-Heidelberg, 14–22 September 2015 melanoma … Biochemistry and molecular biology Presented at the FEBS-EMBO joint APPLY NOW FOR bench to bedside approaches anniversary conference in Paris, France 2016 FUNDING BR-Cuiabá/Poconé, 27 October–7 Workshops November 2014 EMBO MOLECULAR MEDICINE COURSES, WORKSHOPS, Upstream and downstream of Structural and biophysical methods Alexander Goginashvili Hox genes CONFERENCES AND SYMPOSIA for biological macromolecules in IGBMC, Illkirch, France IN-Hyderabad, 14–17 December 2014 1 MARCH AND 1 AUGUST 2015 solution PKD links Golgi to nutrient starvation TW-Taipei, 4–10 May 2015 Cortical development in health KEYNOTE LECTURES … response in pancreatic β cells and disease given by EMBO members at major Presented at the FEBS-EMBO joint IL-Rehovot, 26–29 April 2015 international scientifc meetings anniversary conference in Paris, France Embryonic-extraembryonic 1 FEBRUARY, 1 JUNE, 1 OCTOBER Other EMBO events interfaces: Emphasis on molecular For further information see: control of development in amniotes 15th EMBO|EMBL Science and DE-Göttingen, 6–9 May 2015 www.embo.org/funding-awards/ Society Conference Call for applications courses-workshops Foods are us! On eating and becoming SMC proteins: Chromosomal DE-Heidelberg , 6–7 November 2014 The Beug Foundation has issued a call organizers from bacteria to human for applications for its 2015 Prize for AT-Vienna, 12–15 May 2015 The EMBO Meeting 2015 – Advancing Metastasis Research. Two prizes of 12 the life sciences 000 Euros will be awarded to scientists Developmental circuits in aging ESF | EMBO Symposia UK-Birmingham, 5–8 September 2015 who convincingly present an original GR-Hersonissos, 25–28 May 2015 Bacterial Networks (BacNet15) project to facilitate the implementa- ES-Sant Feliu de Guixols, 9–14 May Macromolecular assemblies at the tion of novel, original approaches to 2015 crossroads of cell stress and function combat cancer metastasis. One of the prizes will be awarded to a scientist IL-Jerusalem, 31 May–4 June 2015 Be there or die? The role of the who obtained a PhD in the past 5 microenvironment in B cell behaviour APPLY NOW FOR FUNDING FOR Mechanisms of plant speciation years; the second prize will go to a in health and disease SE-Norrtälje, 9–13 June 2015 YOUNG INVESTIGATOR scientist who obtained a PhD in the ES-Sant Feliu de Guixols, 16–21 May LECTURES past 12 years. Cell and developmental systems 2015 CH-Arolla, 18–22 August 2015 EMBO funds research lectures given Further information is available at Symbiomes: Systems biology of host- by an EMBO Young Investigator at www.beugstiftung-metastase.org Cell cycle microbiome interactions national or international meetings. HU-Budapest, 4–7 September 2015 PL-Pułtusk, 5–10 June 2015 The deadline for submissions via Applications accepted all year around. the website is November 30, 2014 Stem cell mechanobiology in Thiol-based redox switches in life development and disease sciences IT-Capri, 18–21 October 2015 ES-Sant Feliu de Guixols, 12–17 Save the date … September 2015 … 6th Interaction between the immune system and nanomaterials: For a complete Safety and medical exploitation PL-Pułtusk, 4–9 October 2015 and up-to-date list … of EMBO events please go to 2015 Birmingham events.embo.org United Kingdom 5 – 8 September

12 EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] ©2014 EMBO NEWS FROM THE EMBO COMMUNITY Discovery Centre opens in Dundee On the 1st October, SIR PAUL NURSE, Nobel Laureate, President of The Royal Society of London, and EMBO Secretary General, ofﬁcially opened the new £26 million Discovery Centre at the University of Dundee. The Discovery Centre is home to researchers supported by over £31 million of research grants, bringing the investment in the total operation to well over £57 million. The Discovery Centre for Translational and Interdisciplinary Research will further enhance Dundee’s internationally renowned life sciences capacity, including in drug discovery – an area in which Dundee is the leading University in the United Kingdom and one of the foremost academia- based centres in the world.

Below: Professor Elaine Shemilt and Sir Paul Nurse in the foyer of the

new building ewis J Houghton ©L

he new Centre will provide 180 new, The Discovery Centre has externally funded, high-value jobs for attracted funding from public, TScotland’s Life Sciences sector. They will private and charity sources, join around 900 scientists, research students and including a peer-reviewed support staff from 61 countries who are already Wellcome-Wolfson Capital Award based in the College of Life Sciences at Dundee. in Biomedical Science of £5 “This is a major new facility which will signifi- million, with matched funding by cantly boost Scotland’s biomedical sector and the University of Dundee, and a help us make an impact on people’s lives around £12 million award through the UK the globe,” said Professor Michael Ferguson, Research Partnership Investment Regius Professor of Life Sciences at Dundee. Fund. The Centre also received “The Centre will further develop our already substantial funding from several very strong drug discovery programmes in charitable trusts, government neglected tropical diseases and in other areas of provide an in-house biotech spin-out “pre-incu- funding agencies and research councils as well as unmet medical need, such as cancer, inflamma- bator,” where fledgling spin-out companies can a significant donation from the late Sir Kenneth tion and eczema.” be nurtured before reaching critical mass. “We Murray, one of the world’s most distinguished The Centre is also home to a new research are extremely grateful to the organisations and molecular biologists. division of Computational Biology, incorporat- individuals who have generously supported this The facade of the building features large ing Bioinformatics, Biophysics, Data Analysis major investment in Life Sciences at Dundee.” anodised aluminium cladding panels incorporat- and Software Development, and a Laboratory for Sir Paul Nurse said, “I am delighted to be opening artistic abstractions representative of four key Quantitative Proteomics, integrating expertise in ing the Discovery Centre. Life sciences research scales of life science research: molecular, orga- cell biology, mass spectrometry and “big-data” in Dundee has an international reputation and nellar, cellular and tissue. The scientific images analytics. this new centre provides exciting opportunities to have been translated into artwork by Professor “These highly interdisciplinary and high-tech bring different disciplines together, each bringing Elaine Shemilt and her team from Duncan of activities are essential to the future of life scienc- expertise to bear on aspects of larger, systems- Jordanstone College of Art and Design. In addi- es research and provide many opportunities,” level problems relating to biology, drug discovery tion, the new Centre contains a gallery called said Professor Ferguson. “The Centre will also and drug design.” LifeSpace for art-science collaborative projects.

©2014 EMBO EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] 13 NEWS FROM THE EMBO COMMUNITY New home for the Telethon Institute of Genetics and Medicine Laboratories, ofﬁces and research services in a former factory

he Telethon Institute of Genetics and even a small gym. “The new space offers TIGEM The growth of research funding resulted in an Medicine (TIGEM) is a multidisciplinary the ideal setting for the full development of our increase of personnel and an urgent need for Tresearch Institute devoted to the study of current programmes, the expansion of some criti- additional space. the mechanisms underlying rare genetic diseas- cal areas and new recruitments,” says Andrea Research at TIGEM is focused on three stra- es and to the development of new therapies. Ballabio, EMBO Member and Scientific Director tegic programs: Cell Biology of Genetic Diseases, Founded twenty years ago, the institute is one of of the Institute. “Our plan is to continue perform- Molecular Therapy and Systems Biology, and the leading centres for fundamental life science ing excellent basic research in the field of genetic Functional Genomics. The Institute employs 200 research in Italy. It is particularly renowned for diseases with a move towards the development of Italian and foreign researchers in fifteen inde- its research on neurodegenerative diseases, lyso- new therapies.” pendent research groups and seven research somal disorders, membrane trafficking defects, Over the past five years, TIGEM has made a facilities including advanced microscopy, bioin- disorders of liver metabolism, and eye diseases. significant step to translate discoveries into clini- formatics, high-content screening, next genera- Earlier this year, the institute moved to a newly cal applications and has built strategic alliances tion sequencing and viral vector production. Five refurbished 5000-square-meter complex on the with biotechnology companies to support trans- scientists have received grants from the European former Olivetti campus in Pozzuoli. Pozzuoli is lational studies and clinical trials. The Italian Research Council. TIGEM has also established a small town at the Mediterranean Sea, adjacent Telethon Foundation has invested considerably in international postdoctoral and graduate training to Napoli. The campus is a historic, architectural TIGEM by providing the critical financial support programmes. www.tigem.it complex that used to host the old Olivetti factory. and a foundation for further funding from other The new building has large open-space laborato- sources. Today, more than 80 percent of TIGEM’s ries, specialized facilities, a large auditorium and financial support comes from external sources.

New leadership structure at IMM Three former EMBO Young Investigators are now steering the affairs of the Lisbon-based Instituto de Medicina Molecular (IMM)

fter celebrating a decade of existence, the Instituto de Medicina Molecular, formerly Adirected by EMBO member Maria Carmo- Fonseca, has a new leadership. The renowned malaria researcher Maria Mota is now Executive Director, while Maria Carmo-Fonseca became the institute’s President. Other members of the board of directors include Vice-Director Bruno Silva- Santos and Henrique Veiga-Fernandes, Director of Strategy. “We all represent the new generation of researchers that returned to Portugal in the past decade to lead independent laboratories at IMM,” says Silva-Santos. It was Maria Mota who proposed a mix of personalities and versa- tile expertise at the helm of IMM to provide the best solutions to the challenges ahead. The other reason for sharing responsibilities was to stay active in their laboratories, especially as all three scientists are still in their early forties. “We are by far the youngest directors of a research institution in Portugal,” concludes Mota. Under Carmo-Fonseca’s direction, IMM estab- ©IMM lished itself as one of the leading biomedical From left: research institutions in Portugal. The aim now Bruno Silva-Santos, Maria Mota, Henrique Veiga-Fernandes is to turn it into a European player by attracting more foreign and established principal investiga- ﬁxed structure of departments based on tradi- us establish international networks with fellow tors. The strategy is to tap additional funds – both tional disciplines into a ﬂexible, multidisciplinary scientists,” comments Silva-Santos. To further within Horizon 2020 and with private institutions organization. develop and promote IMM within the European – that will allow for better starting packages, state- “The EMBO Young Investigator Programme research community seems like a natural step of-the-art facilities and international networking. allowed us all to gain knowledge about various forward. www.imm.fm.ul.pt This will go hand in hand with converting the institutional models across Europe, and helped

THE EMBO EMBO Molecular Medicine JOURNAL

RESEARCH ARTICLE RESEARCH ARTICLE RESEARCH ARTICLE RESEARCH ARTICLE

Dendritic cells affect onset and A new therapeutic strategy Researchers reveal transcrip- A computational study of the progress of psoriasis for stroke? tion factor’s likely role in Warburg effect human intestinal cancer Different types of dendritic cells A new study in The EMBO Journal Over the last decade, researchers in human skin have assorted shows that the mitochondrial in the field of cancer metabolism functions in the early and more protein Mfn2 may be a future have mainly focused on study- advanced stages of psoriasis report therapeutic target for reducing ing how tumorigenic metabolic researchers in the journal EMBO neuronal death in the late phases rewiring supports cancer prolifera- Molecular Medicine. The scientists of an ischemic stroke. Dr. Francesc tion. In this new study, scientists suggest that new strategies to regu- Soriano, Ramón y Cajal researcher performed the first genomescale late the composition of dendritic at the Department of Cell Biology computational analysis of the cells in psoriatic skin lesions might of the University of Barcelona, has metabolic underpinnings of cancer represent an approach for the coordinated the study. Researchers in Spain have deter- migration. The researchers built future treatment of the disease. Mfn2 is a mitochondrial protein mined how a transcription factor genomescale metabolic models of “Our experiments have revealed that involved in the regulation of known as Mirror regulates tumour- the NCI60 cell lines that capture increases in the number of plasma- the morphology and function of like growth in the intestines of fruit the Warburg effect (aerobic cytoid dendritic cells are impor- mitochondria. The team led by flies. The scientists believe a related glycolysis) as it typically occurs tant early triggers of the disease Dr. Soriano recently discovered system may be at work in humans in cancer cells. The extent of the while other types of dendritic that the reduction in Mfn2 protein during the progression of colorectal Warburg effect in each of these cell cells, the Langerhans cells, help to levels occurs four hours after the cancer due to the observation of line models was quantified by the protect the balance of the immune initiation of the excitotoxicity in similar genes and genetic interac- ratio of glycolytic to oxidative ATP response that is established during in vitro and in vivo animal models. tions in cultured colorectal cancer flux, which was found to be highly inflammation of the skin,” said Excitotoxicity is the process by cells. positively associated with cancer EMBO Member Maria Sibilia, a which nerve cells are damaged and “We have been able to use flies as cell migration. They predicted that Professor at the Medical University killed by excessive stimulation by a model system to study molecular targeting genes that mitigate the of Vienna in Austria, and one of neurotransmitters such as gluta- events that are very similar to the Warburg effect by reducing the ATP the lead authors of the study. mate and related substances. steps that take place in colorectal flux may specifically inhibit cancer The researchers observed an In vivo experiments in the current cancer in humans and we have migration. increase in the accumulation of study revealed that if Mfn2 reduc- been able to use this system to By testing the antimigratory effects plasmacytoid dendritic cells in the tion is stopped, delayed excitotoxic identify new genetic regulations of silencing the 17 top predicted psoriatic lesions of patients as well cell death is blocked. The research relevant to human disease,” says genes in four breast and lung as in mice that are model organ- team found that the Mfn2 reduction Andreu Casali, lead author of the cancer cell lines, the researchers isms for the study of the disease. is triggered by a genetic transcrip- study and a research associate found that up to 13 of these novel In contrast, the levels of another tion mechanism. The researchers at the Institute for Research in predictions significantly attenuate type of dendritic cells, known as also discovered that MEF2 is the Biomedicine in Barcelona. cell migration either in all or one Langerhans cells, were significantly transcription factor involved in Mutations in two signalling path- cell line only, while having almost decreased in the lesions compared this process. These findings are an ways – the Wnt and EGFR/Ras no effect on cell proliferation. In to healthy skin in humans and important step forward in finding pathways – are known to activate accordance with the predictions, a mice. If the levels of plasmacy- ways to reverse Mfn2 reduction. tumour-like growths in the intes- significant reduction was observed toid dendritic cells in mice were The main objective of the research tines of fruit flies. In Drosophila, in the ratio between the experi- decreased during the early stages in the long term is to design thera- the researchers were able to show mentally measured extracellular of the disease then the symptoms peutic strategies to reduce damage that activity of the Decapentaplegic acidification rate (ECAR) and rate of psoriasis were quelled. A similar due to stroke. (Dpp) pathway suppresses the of oxygen consumption (OCR) decrease in Langerhans cells at an growth of these intestinal tumours following these perturbations. early stage of the disease had no Mfn2 downregulation in excitotoxicity but that this suppression is coun- effect. If the levels of Langerhans causes mitochondrial dysfunction and teracted by the Mirror transcrip- A computational study of the Warburg cells were reduced at advanced delayed neuronal death tion factor, a specific type of Irx effect identifes metabolic targets inhibit- Alejandro Martorell-Riera, Marc Segarra- stages of the disease, the symptoms transcription factor. ing cancer migration Mondejar, Juan P Muñoz, Vanessa Ginet, Keren Yizhak, Sylvia E Le Dévédec, Vasiliki of psoriasis were exacerbated. Jordi Olloquequi, Jeús Pérez-Clausell, Maria Rogkoti, Franziska Baenke, Vincent Manuel Palacín, Manuel Reina, Julien C de Boer, Christian Frezza, Almut Schulze, Puyal, Antonio Zorzano, Iro/Irx transcription factors negatively regulate Dpp/TGF-beta pathway activity Bob van de Water, Eytan Ruppin Specifc roles for dendritic cell subsets Francesc X Soriano Source: Adapted from the paper during initiation and progression Source: Adapted from University of during intestinal tumorigenesis Òscar Martorell, Francisco M. Barriga, Read the paper: of psoriasis Barcelona press release DOI: 10.15252/msb.20134993 Elisabeth Glitzner, Ana Korosec, Patrick M. Read the paper: Anna Merlos-Suárez, Camille Stephan- Brunner, Barbara Drobits, Nicole Amberg, DOI: 10.15252/embj.201488327 Otto Attolini, Jordi Casanova, Eduard Helia B. Schonthaler, Tamara Kopp, Erwin Batlle, Elena Sancho and Andreu Casali F. Wagner, Georg Stingl, Martin Holcmann Read the paper: and Maria Sibilia DOI: 10.15252/embr.201438622 Read the paper: DOI: 10.15252/emmm.201404114

©2014 EMBO EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] 15 NEWS FROM THE EMBO COMMUNITY Centre for Evolution and Cancer The Institute of Cancer Research, London, recently established a Centre for Evolution and Cancer in 2013. The goal is to assemble a multidisciplinary team of investigators that will interrogate cancer afresh using evolutionary principles derived from ecology and state-of-the-art cellular, genomic and bioinformatic technologies. The hope is to improve the survival of patients with cancer by determining how best to thwart the evolutionary resilience of the disease.

volution by natural selection is the foun- says Professor Mel Greaves, EMBO Member and Cancer brings together computational biologists, dation of biology. It should be no surprise Founding Director of the Centre for Evolution and geneticists, cell biologists and clinical scientists Etherefore that it has great relevance to Cancer. to tackle these questions. Research initiatives cancer. The idea that cancer is fundamentally a Looking at cancer in the context of evolution include efforts to identify the genetic diversity process of somatic cell evolution was first advo- has major implications for the way scientists within individual tumours. Scientists are also cated in the 1970s. Since then the concept has think about the fundamental biology of cancer looking at ways to profile tumours through genet- been validated, greatly elaborated and the strik- and attempts to control it. This also applies to ic fingerprints that could predict progression of ing parallels with Darwinian evolution by natu- evolutionary considerations of why humans are disease, metastases or drug resistance. The genet- ral selection in ecosystems highlighted. Cancer so vulnerable to cancer. “Evolutionary biology is ic diversity of cancer stem cells is also a focus genomics has greatly endorsed this perspective by not a sub-topic of cancer sciences, it is a concep- of work at the centre. The hope is that one day providing detailed genetic descriptions and tech- tual framework for everything in cancer,” says stem cells may be the target for cancer treatment nologies for interrogating single cells and multire- Greaves. and provide information on what type of targeted gional small biopsies, revealing space-time genet- Researchers at the centre seek to answer treatment is likely to work for a patient. ic diversification of cancer cells and allowing three big questions in cancer medicine: why are clonal phylogenies, or evolutionary history, to be humans so vulnerable to cancer; what deter- inferred. “It’s a striking fact that every patient’s mines the unpredictable development of cancers Further information is available at cancer has an individually unique and variegated in the body over time; and why is drug resist- www.icr.ac.uk/our-research/our-research- clonal architecture and evolutionary trajectory,” ance so frequent? The Centre for Evolution and centres/centre-for-evolution-and-cancer Journalists and scientists share a common goal EMBO Fellow TYLER SHENDRUK swapped his lab coat for a suit and a tie to work at the Financial Times of London last September. In EMBOencounters he tells his story about what it feels like to work for one the most respected newspapers worldwide.

don’t think many academics get to research any number of time zones, writing the article and subjects as varied as the evolutionary biol- even acquiring accompanying images. Since the I ogy of rabbits, the Rosetta space mission FT is a classy institution, this was done while and hypothetical quantization of space-time. sporting a tie – certainly not the traditional rega- However, this is only a selection of the topics I lia of working scientists. Such hyperactive daily was lucky enough to cover as the British Science productivity is mind-boggling compared to the Association’s (BSA) Media Fellow at the Financial perfectly acceptable month it took me to craft my Times (FT) of London. The BSA drops scientists response to the latest peer-review process I went into Britain’s most respected newsrooms for a through. possible to as wide an audience as possible. In month to build bridges between journalism and But there are striking similarities as well. My practice much of this partnership is institution- science communities. short time at the FT convinced me that science alized through press releases, which scientists At first glance, these might appear to be and journalism are truly sister vocations. Both should view as publications in their own right, long bridges indeed. Anna Williams, the New journalists and scientists work far too hard and embargoes, which give journalists sufficient Scientist’s media fellow, roundly summarized at jobs they love for a pittance; we both work time to cover science news. the key difference between our communities by strange hours; both doggedly strive to discover In maintaining and improving our relationship blogging that facts “are a commodity to be traded, the underlying reality in the well-honed chaos of with journalism, we need to recognize that we but the exchange rate is very steep. Scientists... newsrooms or laboratories; and we both possess have both shared and differing goals. We do not cherish the few true facts that they might be a definite moral obligation to communicate what need to spend a month at the FT to step away lucky enough to generate over the course of their we uncover to the wider world. from our viewpoint as academics and see science careers... Journalists are fact hungry. They will Engaging with the media takes effort but it stories from journalists’ perspective. Science procure several precious facts from a handful of is our responsibility. Some of us enjoy it more reporters are searching all the time for the most different scientists before breakfast.” than others, just as some are fonder of teaching. concise, engaging narratives so that they can Even as a visitor at the FT, I wrote nearly an Although we experts may not always be content keep casual readers informed about the rapidly article per day for science editor Clive Cookson. with specifics in science articles, journalists and advancing and often inconsistent forefront of This entailed identifying potential stories, doing scientists share a common goal. We both want scientific discovery. That is certainly a goal that background research, contacting interviewees in discoveries explained as clearly and concisely as we can all respect and support.

16 EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] ©2014 EMBO NEWS FROM THE EMBO COMMUNITY Every institute needs a good canteen On the occasion of the 100th birthday of Nobel Prize Laureate Max F. Perutz, the Max F. Perutz Laboratories (MFPL) held a celebratory scientiﬁc symposium entitled Crossing Frontiers in Life Sciences at the University of Vienna on September 11–12. MFPL is a joint venture of the University of Vienna and the Medical University of Vienna.

insights into how his career had been inﬂuenced by working with the Nobelist. “He changed my life and was tremendously important for my education. On the train to London to our collab- orators at the Royal Institution, Max was often teaching me science, which I didn’t realize at that time.” For Rossmann, the most important effect of solving the structure of haemoglobin is that for the ﬁrst time scientists could prove on a molecular level that Darwin’s theory of evolution was correct. Tom Steitz, who received the Nobel Prize in 2009 for his work on the structure and function of the ribosome, honoured Perutz as a great inspira- tion. This was particularly true for himself, he explained, as the Dunham Lectures that Perutz held in 1963 in Harvard had inspired him to become a protein crystallographer. Richard Henderson, who had worked with Perutz at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology in FPL, Daniel Hinterramskogler

©M Cambridge until his death, revealed in his clos- ing EMBO Lecture that the laboratory still follows he Vienna-born Max F. Perutz, who died dynamics and RNA-biology. Former colleagues some of Perutz’s ideas. One of them is that every in 2002, was one of the founding fathers and friends of Max Perutz honoured the research- institute needs a good canteen as a place where Tof molecular biology and EMBO. He was er and scientific leader. scientists can meet and exchange information. among the first to build bridges between biology Michael Rossmann, a former postdoctoral “Often you go there with your brilliant idea and and physics to solve the structure of haemoglobin, researcher of Max Perutz in Cambridge in the then it gets shot down within half an hour. And for which he and his colleague John Kendrew early 1960s, opened the symposium. Rossmann, you realize that this half an hour saved you a year were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in whose career as a crystallographer spans almost of work,” said Henderson. 1962. 70 years, developed the first computer programs “The symposium was a terrific occasion for At the symposium, more than twenty scientists to analyze Perutz’s X-ray crystallography data scientific exchange, and also highlighted Vienna presented their latest findings in structural biol- and solve protein structures. His talk From hemo- as a life science hub,” concluded Graham Warren, ogy, cell signaling, bioinformatics, chromosome globin to the structure of viruses gave personal Scientific Director of the MFPL.

an online database to accompany published TripAdvisor for life science literature (www.lablore.com). The authors compare LabLore to other well-known researchers online services. Just like TripAdvisor, it offers a forum to record the scientists’ opinions and docu- LabLore – an online tool to help ment their experience with the published data. plan future experiments The tool is especially useful as research becomes more interdisciplinary and projects draw from ur project was to find out the activity of a results outside one’s core field of competence. specific transcription factor in one of our Aurelio’s own research interests include insulin Omutants,” reports Aurelio Teleman, group signalling and tissue growth control. leader at the German Cancer Research Center LabLore stands or falls with the users’ engage- and former EMBO Young Investigator. “To do this, ment. Comments can be voted up or down, users we looked at a related paper where the authors ©DKFZ can ask anonymous questions to the authors and reported a transcriptional signature for this tran- opt for automatic email updates whenever there scription factor. When we went on to test it, the every laboratory,” explains Aurelio. What he is activity related to papers of interest. results could not be reproduced.” refers to is information about which results are “If the scientists take a few minutes to write What Aurelio experienced with his project reproducible and which are not, which conclu- their comments on LabLore, I am confident that happens to many scientists. They build experi- sions have held up to the test of time and which we will all benefit from it,” concludes Aurelio. ments on data that turn out to be unreliable, are shaky. A lot of this knowledge is not shared Wikipedia also started with relatively few arti- follow the wrong paths and as a result – waste amongst laboratories. cles – and it has grown to become an invaluable their time. “There is an amazing amount of infor- To address these problems, Aurelio and his resource. mation relating to published articles in each and colleague Thomas Horn established LabLore,

©2014 EMBO EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] 17 NEWS FROM THE EMBO COMMUNITY Sunscreen insuffcient for 2014 protection from melanoma Nobel Prize recent publication in Nature reports that The researchers are careful to point out that sunscreen cannot be relied upon exclu- their studies do validate public health campaigns rofessor John O’Keefe, Director of the sively to prevent malignant melanoma, that promote sunscreen protection for individuals Sainsbury Wellcome Centre in Neural A 1 the most deadly form of skin cancer. The work, at risk of melanoma. The caveat is that sunscreen PCircuits and Behaviour at University which was carried out by a team of researchers does not provide complete protection and must College London, Edvard Moser, Director of supported by Cancer Research UK and led by therefore be combined with other sun protection the Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience EMBO Member Richard Marais, examined the strategies to ensure full safety. and Centre for Neural Computation at molecular effects of ultraviolet light on the skin Malignant melanoma is the major cause of the Norwegian University of Science and of mice at risk of melanoma and tested whether death from skin cancer. In the United States alone, Technology, and May-Britt Moser, Director the development of the disease was blocked by the number of cases has increased by an average of the Centre for Neural Computation at sunscreen. of 4% each year since 1970. In Europe, melano- the Norwegian University of Science and “This study provides proof that sunscreen does ma affects over 100,000 new patients each year Technology have been awarded the 2014 not offer complete protection from the damaging and rates continue to increase in most European Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. effects of ultraviolet light,” says Marais, Director countries. In many countries the rate is almost John O’Keefe became an EMBO Member of the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute. doubling every decade. this year. Edvard and Britt Moser joined the The researchers revealed that ultraviolet light EMBO membership in 2011 and 2012, respec- produces mutations in the p53 gene of mice, a REFERENCE tively. The award was made in recognition gene that under normal conditions helps protect 1. Viros et al. (2014) Nature 511(7510): 478–482. of their discoveries of cells that constitute a cells from the effects of DNA damage due to this positioning system in the brain. type of irradiation. When the mice were protect- From their work, John O´Keefe, May-Britt ed by sunscreen the amount of DNA damage Moser and Edvard Moser have elucidated was considerably reduced and the development how the brain of larger organisms creates of melanoma was delayed. However, sunscreen a map of the space surrounding themselves did not offer complete protection and exposure to and how these organisms can navigate their ultraviolet light still induced melanoma albeit at way through a complex environment. This a reduced rate. problem has vexed philosophers and scientists for centuries.

Living transplantation centre for Yamanaka pancreatic cells receives MBO Member Per-Olof Berggren and his observation of unique structural changes that research team have been developing a increased the mobility of cytotoxic T lympho- honorary Etransplantation technique that allows cytes, results that were not predicted by in vitro researchers to study the function and survival studies. of pancreatic islet cells and other tissue in the More recently, in collaboration with Zhibin degree anterior chamber of the mouse, rat and monkey Chen, the group published another article in the eye.1 The work, which started in 2008, has been Journal of Experimental Medicine where they he University of Hong Kong has dubbed the “living window” model and allows also used the “living window” to uncover a novel awarded Shinya Yamanaka an honor- scientists to study living cells in a non-invasive mechanism of T regulatory cell function in curb- Tary degree in recognition of his system at single-cell resolution. ing immune attack by antigen-speciﬁc effector T invaluable intellectual, social and cultural In the case of transplanted pancreatic cells, cells against pancreatic islets. The mechanism contributions to society and the world. The researchers can gain valuable information by that was uncovered comprised motility regula- presentation of the award took place on the directly imaging healthy and diabetic cells in tion of effector T cells within the target tissue occasion of the EMBO Workshop entitled action. In time, this type of investigation may by direct cell-cell contact.3 Moreover, the “living Stem cells and epigenetics in cancer held lead to new ways to tackle diabetes and other window” was successfully adopted as a reporter from 16–18 October at the University of diseases. of the in situ status of the endocrine pancreas.4 Hong Kong. Professor Yamanaka received The scientists have demonstrated the effec- the doctor of science, honoris causa, award tiveness of the transplantation procedure in the REFERENCE as part of the 191st degree ceremony of the eyes of living mice. In addition to enabling direct 1 Speier et al. (2008) Nature Medicine 14(5): 574–578. university that took place at the Faculty of visualization of a variety of transplanted tissues, 2 Abdulreda et al. (2011) Proceedings of the National Medicine Building on October 18. the approach provides a way to screen drugs and Academy of Sciences 108(31): 12 863–12 868. Past recipients of the honorary degree 3 Miska et al. (2014) Journal of Experimental Medicine monitor the effects of treatment on target tissues award from the University of Hong Kong 211(3): 441–456. over longer periods of time. 4 IIegems et al. (2013) Proceedings of the National Academy include Dr. Nelson Mandela and Mother In 2011, the group reported in a publica- of Sciences 110(51): 20 581–20 586. Theresa. The degree is the highest accolade tion in Proceedings of the National Academy of the university can bestow on an individual. Sciences on the use of the “living window” to study immune responses during islet allograft rejection in real-time.2 The ﬁndings included the

18 EMBOencounters | Autumn 2014 | [email protected] ©2014 EMBO EVENTS A GOOD READ RESEARCH A good read – Awards of excellence Publications from the EMBO Community EMBO MEMBERS EMBO MEMBERS, YOUNG INVESTIGATORS & FELLOWS Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award sciences as well as mathematics, engineer- This year’s Lasker Award for basic medical ing and medicine; currently there are Mutations in SPRTN cause early onset PLETHORA gradient formation mecha- research goes to EMBO Associate Member members. Lucia Banci has also been appoint- hepatocellular carcinoma, genomic nism separates auxin responses Peter Walter of the University of California, ed member of the EMBL Council in . instability and progeroid features Ari Pekka Mähönen, Kalika Prasad San Francisco. He receives the award jointly US National Academy of Sciences Jaime Lopez-Mosqueda (EMBO Fellow) (EMBO Fellows), Ben Scheres with Kazutoshi Mori of Kyoto University in and colleagues (EMBO Member) and colleagues Japan for their work on the unfolded protein Christopher Dobson of the University of Nature Genetics | September Nature | August response. Cambridge was elected Foreign Associate doi: . /ng. doi: . /nature of the US National Academy of Sciences in Wolfson Research Merit Award . He has also been awarded the Early lineage restriction in tempo- Neural correlates of water reward in H.P. Heineken Prize for Biochemistry and rally distinct populations of Mesp Malcolm White of the University of St. thirsty Drosophila Biophysics from the Royal Netherlands progenitors during mammalian heart Andrews was awarded a Wolfson Research Suewei Lin, David Owald (EMBO Fellows), Academy of Arts and Sciences and he development Merit award by the Royal Society in Scott Waddell (EMBO Member) recognition of his laboratory’s work on the received the Feltrinelli International Prize Cédric Blanpain (EMBO Member), and colleagues CRISPR-Cas system for antiviral defence. for Medicine from the Accademia Nazionale Fabienne Lescroart (EMBO Fellow) Nature Neuroscience | September White’s award recognises his research into dei Lincei in Rome this year. doi: . /nn. and colleagues a recently discovered immune system in EMBO YOUNG INVESTIGATORS Nature Cell Biology | August microbes. An evolutionary arms race between doi: . /ncb KRAB zinc nger genes / and SVA/L Early Career Life Scientist Award A new tubulin-binding site and pharma- Gruber Genetics Prize retrotransposons Manuel Théry, research director at the cophore for microtubule-destabilizing Maximilian Haeussler (EMBO Fellow) The plant scientist and geneticist Sir Saint Louis Hospital in Paris, received the anticancer drugs and colleagues David Baulcombe of the University of ASCB Early Career Life Scientist Award Cambridge will share the Gruber Prize Nature | September Michel O. Steinmetz (EMBO Member) for . Théry was selected for his devel- doi: . /nature and colleagues for Genetics with Gary Ruvkun and Victor opment of a novel and innovative microfab- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | Ambros. David Baulcombe will also be the rication technology, which he has applied to Substrate binding and speci city of August next president of the Biochemical Society fundamental cell biological problems. The rhomboid intramembrane protease doi: . /pnas. from January . award will be presented at the ASCB/ revealed by substrate–peptide complex IFCB Meeting. structures Glial origin of mesenchymal stem cells in Royal Medal by the Royal Society a tooth model system Kvido Strisovsky (EMBO Installation Howard R. Morris, Emeritus Professor at Gold Award of the LEO Pharma Research Grantee) and colleagues Marketa Kaucka (EMBO Fellow) the Imperial College, London, has recently Foundation and colleagues The EMBO Journal | September been awarded the Royal Medal by Kim Jensen of the University of Copenhagen Nature | July doi: . /embj. the Royal Society “for pioneering work in received the Gold Award of the LEO Pharma doi: . /nature biomolecular mass spectrometry including Gibbon genome gives insights on the fast Research Foundation worth million DKK strategy and instrument design enabling karyotype evolution of small apes BRCA prevents R-loop accumulation (around , Euros) for his pioneer- and associates with TREX- mRNA export advanced discovery research and for ing advances in dermatology research. Duncan T. Odom (EMBO Young factor PCID outstanding entrepreneurship in biophar- Kim Jensen’s research focuses on how the Investigator) and colleagues maceutical characterisation accelerating Andrés Aguilera (EMBO Member) epidermis, the outer layer of the skin, is Nature | September the release of new medicinal products” constantly renewed throughout life in an doi: . /nature and colleagues organised manner by epidermal stem cells. Nature | July Heinrich Wieland Prize Structural basis for the assembly of the doi: . /nature SXL-UNR translation regulatory complex Reinhard Jahn has been selected as the European Research Council Grants The structural analysis of shark IgNAR recipient of the international Heinrich Michael Sattler (EMBO Member), scientists are receiving “Proof-of- antibodies reveals evolutionary princi- Wieland Prize for his studies on membrane Janosch Hennig (EMBO Fellow) Concept” grants of up to , euros ples of immunoglobulins fusion, synaptic vesicles, and neurotrans- and colleagues each from the European Research Council Janosch Hennig (EMBO Fellow) mitter release – processes that occur when this year. This “top-up” funding is designed Nature | September cells grow, transport substances, or signal. doi: . /nature and colleagues to help researchers who already hold an Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | With the , Euro prize the Boehringer ERC grant, to test the market potential of Metabolic regulator LKB is crucial for June Ingelheim Foundation is honouring the their frontier research. Kerem Pekkan of Schwann cell–mediated axon mainte- doi: . /pnas. pioneering achievements of the Director the Koç University, Turkey, and Ido Amit of nance Bogdan Beirowski (EMBO Fellow), at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Cell adhesion geometry regulates non- the Weizmann Institute, Israel, are among Nature Neuroscience | September Chemistry in Göttingen, Germany. the awardees. doi: . /NN. random DNA segregation and asymmet- ric cell fates in mouse skeletal muscle Michael and Kate Bárány Award A sentinel protein assay for simultane- stem cells ously quantifying cellular processes Sarah Teichmann of EMBL-EBI and the Appointments Shahragim Tajbakhsh (EMBO Member), Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is the Rita Hrabakova (EMBO Member) and Manuel Théry (EMBO Young Investigator) recipient of the Michael and Kate Bárány EMBO YOUNG INVESTIGATOR colleagues and colleagues Award for Young Investigators from the The Board of the Academy of Finland Nature Methods | September Cell Reports | May Biophysical Society. She received this award has announced former EMBO Young doi: . /NMETH. doi: http://dx.doi.org/ . /j.celrep. . . for her contributions to two distinct areas: Investigator Johanna Ivaska from A unique inhibitor-binding site in ERK / The progress of science. Past, present protein interactions and complexes; and the University of Turku as one of the is associated with slow binding kinetics and future global regulation of gene expression. The seven new Academy Professors for Michael and Kate Bárány Award for Young Madalena Tarsounas (EMBO Young Arthur Rörsch (EMBO Member) – . The aim of this funding Investigator) and colleagues Investigators recognizes scientists who have from the Academy of Finland for Humanities , not yet achieved the rank of full professor. Nature Chemical Biology | September doi: . /h x x Academic Professor research posts doi: . /NCHEMBIO. is to facilitate full-time scienti c American Academy of Arts and Sciences research for internationally renowned Systematic characterization of deubiqui- Claudio Stern of the University College researchers. tylating enzymes for roles in maintaining Editorial London was awarded a Foreign Honorary genome integrity Member of the American Academy of Arts Carlos le Sage (EMBO Fellow), Managing Editor and Sciences this year. Stephen P. Jackson (EMBO Member) Next issue and colleagues Barry Whyte Academia Europaea EMBOencounters Nature Cell Biology | September Editor Nektarios Tavernarakis of the University doi: . /ncb Yvonne Kaul of Crete Medical School has been invited to The next EMBOencounters issue – join the Academia Europaea Section of Cell Rabbit genome analysis reveals a poly- Proof reading Biology as one of the eight new members. Winter | – will be genic basis for phenotypic change during Meryl Schneider dispatched in February . domestication Lucia Banci of the University of Florence Print & Web layout has joined the Biochemistry and Molecular Leif Andersson (EMBO Member) Biology Section of the academy. Academia Please send your suggestions, Sandra Krahl and colleagues Europaea was founded in to promote contributions and news to Science | August E-Newsletter & Web version excellence in science and scholarship [email protected] doi: . /science. Yvonne Kaul around Europe. Its membership comprises by January . the humanities, social, physical and life

6th

advancing the life sciences 2015 Birmingham United Kingdom 5 – 8 September

Speakers Ewan Birney 20 Susan M. Gasser Conference concurrent sessions Stephen P. Jackson covering the latest research Chairs Robert Martienssen in the life sciences Geneviève Almouzni Daniel St Johnston Gillian M. Griffiths Joan A. Steitz Jürgen Knoblich Azim M. Surani Inder M. Verma Olivier Voinnet Peter Walter Fiona Watt

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