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Sarah Moreira

IBEC celebrates its 20th anniversary with an institutional event at the Fundació Joan Miró

The Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) celebrated its 20th anniversary on Wednesday 21 October with an institutional event at the Auditorium of the Fundació Joan Miró in Barcelona. Representatives of the Catalan Government, people who have led and supported the centre since its creation, and IBEC researchers looked back on two decades of research at the interface between engineering and the life sciences, and shared their views on the challenges ahead.

The “la Caixa” Foundation funds four health projects involving IBEC, two of them led by the institute

IBEC researchers Samuel Sánchez and Giuseppe Battaglia are leading two of the projects selected in the “la Caixa” Foundation’s 2026 health research and innovation calls. In addition, Pere Roca-Cusachs and Jordi Duran are members of the consortia behind two further projects. The four projects address challenges such as pseudomyxoma peritonei, bladder cancer, Lafora disease and frontotemporal dementia.

OPTOGEN 2026 brings more than 100 optogenetics and neurophotonics experts to Barcelona

From 12 to 14 October, the Barcelona Biomedical Research Park (PRBB) hosted the 11th International Workshop on Technologies for Optogenetics and Neurophotonics (OPTOGEN 2026), co-organised by the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) and the Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO). Over three days, more than a hundred scientists and technologists from around the world gathered to discuss the latest advances in optical methods and their applications in neuroscience, from new implantable devices to the latest molecular tools to study and control brain activity.

Lab-designed molecule reduces amyloid beta, the protein linked to Alzheimer’s disease, in mice

A study led by the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) identifies a molecule, P33, that partially modulates the enzyme that initiates amyloid beta formation. The results, obtained in cell cultures and in mice, open up a new avenue of chemical research into the disease.

IBEC to take part in GLIOLIFE-AECC, the largest research consortium against glioblastoma

The group led by Irene Marco-Rius at IBEC is part of GLIOLIFE-AECC, a project funded with €10 million by the Spanish Association Against Cancer (AECC) and its Scientific Foundation to increase survival in people with glioblastoma, the most common and aggressive brain tumour in adults. The IBEC team will lead the consortium’s innovative radiology line, which will use an advanced imaging technique to study the tumour’s metabolism without the need for invasive procedures.

IBEC takes part in European Researchers’ Night once again, reaching around 290 people

IBEC researchers joined the activities of European Researchers’ Night 2026, held at CosmoCaixa and the Gabriel García Márquez Library last week. With activities on magnets, bacteria, nanoparticles and light, the aim was to showcase excellent research, spark interest in science and show how scientific work has an impact on people’s everyday lives.

LA VANGUARDIA: Benedetta Bolognesi, biotecnóloga: “En el alzhéimer, las proteínas pueden empezar a acumularse veinte años antes de que aparezcan los síntomas”

Doctora por la Universidad de Cambridge, dirige desde 2018 el grupo Transiciones de Fase de Proteínas en la Salud y la Enfermedad del Instituto de Bioingeniería de Cataluña (IBEC). Bolognesi estudia cómo algunas proteínas empiezan a unirse y acumularse, cómo pueden contribuir al daño cerebral y cómo intervenir antes de que el daño sea irreversible.

IBEC launches IBEC On Air, a podcast exploring bioengineering beyond the lab

The Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) has today released the first episode of IBEC On Air, its new science communication podcast and one of the activities marking the institute’s 20th anniversary. Across seven episodes of around 20 minutes each, researchers from the institute talk about their work, the questions that drive it and the journey behind each project. The podcast is available on Spotify, iVoox, Apple Podcasts and YouTube.

IBEC engineers a tunable material inspired by insect exoskeletons

A new study led by the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) shows that a single biomaterial can be locally “programmed” to be rigid in some areas and flexible in others, mimicking a strategy long used by insects and other arthropods. As a proof of concept, described in the Journal of Materials Chemistry A, the researchers built articulated structures combining rigid segments and flexible joints to enable controlled movement within a single continuous sheet. Inspired by how nature builds complex structures from a single material, the approach could simplify both manufacturing and recycling. Locally tuning one biodegradable material with trace amounts of metals avoids producing different materials for different functions and could allow the whole object to be recycled or composted together, eliminating the sorting and separate recovery that multi-material products require.