IBEC Seminar: Wenting Zhao
2024-05-31 10:00 - 12:00 (Europe/Madrid) | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Engineering the Nanoscale Membrane Topography in Cells
Wenting Zhao, School of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and Institute for Digital Molecular Analytics and Science (IDMxS), Singapore
Abstract.
Cell membranes serve as a central platform to host a variety of proteins essential for cellular activities such as cell signaling, morphogenesis, and membrane trafficking. At the same time, the membranes also undergo drastic morphological changes in a number of essential processes, such as endocytosis, intracellular trafficking, and cytokinesis, etc. An intriguing yet challenging question to answer is whether and how the shapes of the membrane impact the dynamics of membrane proteins or the periphery proteins interacting with the membrane. However, membrane shape changes often happen at sub-micro to the nanoscale, which is approaching the limit of conventional microscopy imaging resolution and difficult to examine quantitatively. In this work, we will introduce our efforts in employing vertically aligned nanostructures to generate defined membrane topography in live cells and in vitro. We will discuss our findings on the membrane curvature-guided accumulation of membrane proteins, including oncogenic Ras proteins and viral proteins, as well as the membrane-associated protein condensation. In addition to plasma membrane, we also explore the nanoscale topography guidance on nuclear membrane and its implication in differentiating malignant cancer cells. We envision more new insights would be revealed by bridging advanced nanotechnology to nanoscale dynamics at cell surfaces.

Short Bio
Dr. Wenting Zhao is currently an assistant professor in the School of Chemistry, Chemical Engineering, and Biotechnology at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She received her Ph.D. degree in Bioengineering at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and completed her postdoc training at Stanford University. Her research group aims to reveal the nanoscale interplay between membrane morphology and protein assembly using advance nanofabrication and nanomaterials. Specific focuses of her studies are on the nanoscale topography-guided protein clustering and complex assembly, and their impacts on disease progression, such as cancer progression, viral replication, and immune activation.
Group website: www.wtzhaolab.com.

Nanomotors International Conference
2024-06-03 08:00 - 2024-06-05 17:00 | CosmoCaixa
The Nanomotors International Conference: 20th Anniversary will be held June 2-5, 2024 in Barcelona. This event will gather high-profile plenary and invited speakers and world-class researchers specializing in nanomotors to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first publications in the field.

From the early days of artificial catalytic nanomotors, the expanding field of active matter has moved into new and exciting areas spanning physical length-scales, academic disciplines, and international boundaries.

This conference will feature invited talks, breakout sessions, and posters exploring leading-edge designs and applications of nanomotors. This year’s meeting will focus on biomedical applications and collective behaviour of self-propelled nanomotors, from both experimental and theoretical perspectives.

Nanomotors International will foster collaborations; highlight the positive impact of these technologies on society; promote scientific advances and innovative applications; and explore current and future challenges to bringing these technologies to the clinic and to the market.
Check the program and register here.

IBEC Seminar: Irene Lázaro
2024-06-05 16:00 - 17:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Enhanced regeneration through in vivo cell reprogramming: lessons from the first decade of research and a success story in the mouse heart
Irene de Lázaro, PhD1,2,3
1 Department of Biomedical Engineering, NYU Tandon School of Engineering, New York University
2 Cardiovascular Research Center, NYU School of Medicine and NYU Langone Health
3 Harvard John A Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University

Our lab designs and deploys bioengineering strategies – including gene therapies and nanomedicines – to reprogram cell identity, differentiation and/or cellular responses in living organisms with the ultimate goal of helping tissues regenerate better. In this seminar, I will share the lessons learned after the first decade of in vivo cellular reprogramming research. Moreover, I will present our most recent data that demonstrates that on and off expression of stemness-related transcription factors induces partial reprogramming of cardiac myocytes to a rejuvenated state. In an age-dependent mouse model of heart failure, reprogramming the biological age of cardiac myocytes to a youthful state resulted in significant improvement of cardiac function.

Encuentro De Las Plataformas Isciii De Apoyo A La I+D+I En Biomedicina Y Ciencias De La Salud
2024-06-07 09:30 - 13:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, Parc Científic de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
El Instituto de Bioingeniería de Cataluña acoge la Jornada Informativa de las Plataformas ISCIII de Apoyo a la I+D+i en Biomedicina y Ciencias de la Salud, organizada por la Plataforma ISCIII de Biomodelos y Biobancos (P_ISCIII_BB), la Plataforma ISCIII de Dinamización e Innovación de las Capacidades Industriales del SNS y su Transferencia Efectiva al Sector Productivo (ITEMAS), y la Plataforma ISCIII de Soporte para la Investigación Clínica (SCReN), en adelante denominadas “Plataformas ISCIII”, junto con Nanomed Spain.
Las Plataformas del Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII) de apoyo a la I+D+i en Biomedicina y Ciencias de la Salud constituyen un conjunto de infraestructuras y profesionales, pertenecientes a diversas instituciones, quienes ofrecen servicios transversales para respaldar el sistema de I+D+i. Su objetivo es facilitar la generación y transferencia de conocimiento de alta calidad dentro del Sistema Nacional de Salud.
La sesión incluirá ponencias que abordarán la misión y visión de las tres Plataformas ISCIII, así como el papel de estas en el contexto internacional. Entre los temas a tratar en la Jornada Informativa se encuentran, entre otros, la convergencia de las tres plataformas bajo la coordinación del ISCIII, la transferencia del conocimiento científico a la industria y la sociedad, y el desarrollo de ensayos clínicos

IBEC Seminar: Jan Lammerding
2024-06-12 10:00 - 11:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Nuclear mechanobiology – from striated muscle disease to ultrarapid cellular mechanosensing
Jan Lammerding, PhD, Weill Institute for Cell and Molecular Biology & Meinig School of Biomedical Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
Abstract. The nucleus is the characteristic feature of eukaryotic cells and houses the genomic information of the cell. The Lammerding laboratory is investigating how physical forces acting on the nucleus can challenge the integrity of the nucleus, alter its structure, and cause genomic, transcriptomic, and other functional changes. In this seminar, I will discuss our findings that highlight the importance of the nuclear envelope proteins lamins A/C in mediating nuclear stability and mechanotransduction in mechanically stressed cells and tissues, and how lamin mutations result in reduced nuclear stability and increased nuclear damage in striated muscle cells, which may explain the muscle-specific defects in many diseases caused by lamin mutations (laminopathies). Our data demonstrate that reducing cytoskeletal forces on the fragile lamin A/C mutant nuclei by disrupting the Linker of Nucleoskeleton and Cytoskeleton (LINC) complex is sufficient to reduce nuclear damage in striated muscle tissue and to improve cardiac function and survival in multiple mouse models of lamin A/C related striated muscle disease. Furthermore, by combining cyclic strain application with precision nuclear run-on sequencing (PRO-seq), a novel transcriptome sequencing technique that, unlike traditional RNA sequencing, enriches for nascent RNA transcripts and simultaneously provides a base-pair resolution map of active RNA polymerases, and Omni-ATAC, an improved chromatin accessibility assay, we recently established an experimental pipeline to detect rapid, genome-wide changes in chromatin organization and transcription in response to cyclic mechanical strain. Our studies indicate that cyclic strain application results in the transcription of numerous mechanoresponsive genes within less than 2 minutes, which is faster than the expected time for typical mechanoresponsive cytoplasmic signaling pathways to reach the nucleus, and that the mechanoresponsive genes are already poised for gene transcription. These findings point to an exciting, previously unrecognized role of the nucleus in regulating the activation of mechanoresponsive genes.

Open Science (Spanish)
2024-06-19 09:30 - 13:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, Parc Científic de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
CIENCIA ABIERTA Y PROPIEDAD INTELECTUAL
Open science and intellectual property (IP) regulation share the same fundamental objective of promoting innovation for social, scientific and economic development. However, there may be some tension due to the fact that IP rights can be used as a basis for controlling and managing the way in which protected subject matter can be accessed. The results of scientific research may result in scholarly articles or original databases that can be protected by copyright or inventions that can be protected by patents and other forms of intellectual property. Many open access initiatives, repositories or collaborative projects operate on the basis of clear licensing of intellectual property.
This event will be held in Spanish

La ciencia abierta y la regulación de la propiedad intelectual e industrial (PI) comparten el mismo objetivo fundamental de promover la innovación para el desarrollo social, científico y económico. Sin embargo, puede existir cierta tensión debido al hecho de que los derechos de PI pueden utilizarse como base para controlar y gestionar la forma en que se puede acceder a la materia protegida. Los resultados de la investigación científica pueden dar lugar a artículos académicos o a bases de datos originales que pueden protegerse mediante derechos de autor o invenciones que pueden protegerse mediante patentes y otras formas de propiedad intelectual. Muchas iniciativas, repositorios o proyectos de colaboración de acceso abierto funcionan sobre la base de una concesión clara de licencias de propiedad intelectual.
El Institut de Bioenginyeria de Catalunya junto con la Universitat de Barcelona y Nanomed Spain organiza esta Jornada para exponer y debatir las complementariedades o posibles conflictos entre los dos paradigmas en el marco español, persiguiendo una comprensión clara de su uso y aplicación en el día a día de la práctica científica.
Registro aquí: Ciencia Abierta y Propiedad Intelectual – NANOMED Spain

Second Hand Exchange Market
2024-06-21 08:00 - 15:00 | Cluster II
To celebrate the World Environment Day (5 June) IBEC’s Sustainability Committee is organizing a second-hand exchange market!
You can bring those pieces of clothing and lab materials that are clean and in good shape, but you don’t use anymore, and take one for free!
SAVE THE DATE:
📅 21st of June
📍 in front of the Cluster II reception
⏰ 9:00 to 15:00
At the end of the day, we will donate all the clothing left to a charity.
❗❗We only accept clean and good-condition clothes and lab material ❗❗

Seminar SparkCyto TECAN
2024-06-25 14:00 - 17:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Multimode User Day
Agenda:
1. Absorbance, Fluorescence and Luminescence
reading modes
1. Incubation options: gas, temperature, shaking, injectors,…
2. Brightfield Imaging
3. Fluorescence Imaging
4. Hands-on session: SparkCyto

Where? Parc Científic de Barcelona
c/Baldiri Reixach, 10. Torre I, Floor 11, Sala Baobab (IBEC)
When? 25th June 2024 (Tuesday), 14-17h
Organizer: Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia – Tecan
Tecan speaker: Nicola Vettore (application specialist)
Registration: https://forms.office.com/e/6mMYTESqe6

IMAB closure project (Catalan)
2024-06-26 17:00 - 18:30 | C/ de Provença, 480, L’Eixample, 08025 Barcelona
As part of IBEC’s science education initiatives, this year we have been running the IMAB project, which aims to bring the latest advances in bioengineering in organ and tissue regeneration to the over-65s. The aim of the project, beyond being a dissemination activity, has been to gather their impressions and transmit them to the scientific community.
We have been holding various sessions in civic centres, adult education centres and university extension classes… And now it is time to fulfil the last objective of the project, to share the opinions of the population gathered over the last few months:
Date: Tuesday 26th June
Place: Espai BiblioLab – Sagrada Familia Library
Location:C/ de Provença, 480, L’Eixample, 08025 Barcelona
Time: from 5 to 6.30 p.m.
This event will be held in Catalan.
This event will be open to all members of the public and will serve to publicise the results and opinions obtained from the population. There will be a short introduction to the project, followed by a talk on the latest advances in organ and tissue regeneration research that was given at the sessions, and finally, the conclusions will be presented.
We hope to see you there!

En el marc de les iniciatives d’educació científica organitzades per l’IBEC, aquest any hem desplegat el projecte IMAB, que mira d’apropar els últims avenços de la Bioenginyeria en la regeneració d’òrgans i teixits a la població més gran de 65 anys. L’objectiu del projecte, més enllà de fer una activitat de divulgació, ha estat recollir les seves impressions i transmetre-les a la comunitat científica.
Hem estat realitzant diverses sessions a centres cívics, escoles d’adults i aules d’extensió universitària… I ara toca complir amb l’últim objectiu del projecte, compartir les opinions de la població recollides aquests darrers mesos:
Data: dimecres 26 de juny
Lloc: Espai BiblioLab – Biblioteca Sagrada Familia
Ubicació: C/ de Provença, 480, L’Eixample, 08025 Barcelona
Horari: de 17 a 18.30h
Aquest esdeveniment estarà obert a tots els públics i servirà per donar a conèixer els resultats i les opinions obtingudes de la població. Farem una petita introducció del projecte, seguidament la xerrada sobre els últims avenços de la recerca en la regeneració d’òrgans i texitis que es feia a les sessions; i per tancar, s’exposaran les conclusions.
Esperem veure-us allà!

GREEN LAB: REDUCING THE IMPACTS OF UNIVERSITY LABORATORIES IN THE ENVIRONMENT
2024-06-28 09:30 - 17:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Parc Científic de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
Laboratories consume three to five times more energy and resources than standard office spaces, with significant environmental impacts from constant equipment operation and disposable plastic use.
Against this background, the project ‘Sustainable Laboratories’ (NACH-LABS), a joint effort of the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences, the Technical University of Darmstadt, and IUTA e.V., the European School of Sustainability Science and Research (ESSSR), the Inter-University Sustainable Development Research Programme and the UK Consortium for Sustainability Research (UK-CSR), are organising the international symposium Green Labs: Reducing the Impacts of University Laboratories on the Environment.
Due to its focus on sustainability, the event will be held online. Therefore, the Sustainability Committee of IBEC, in collaboration with PCB and Nanomed Spain, believes that organizing a satellite event to collectively follow the main event would be a great opportunity to bring together our community, facilitating networking and sharing local experiences.
This event will consist of two parts. In the first part, the official conference will be streamed. The second part will be an opportunity for local networking and experience sharing of our journey towards more sustainable research.
We invite you to present a 5-minute short talk on your experiences in making your labs more sustainable. You can register and send your proposals.
Registration here: Green Lab: Reducing the impacts of University laboratories in the environment (ibecbarcelona.eu)

IBEC Seminar: Shahid Uddin
2024-07-05 10:00 - 12:00 | IBEC, floor 11, Tower I, Baldiri Reixac 4-8, 08028 Barcelona, Spain
Developability assessment of biologics and formulation of novel molecules
Shahid Uddin, PhD, MBA, Senior Director of Drug Product, Formulation & Stability within the CMC department at Immunocore, UK
It’s vital to ensure appropriate assessment of molecules at the early research phase is carried out to risk mitigate movement into the development phase. This ensures the best risk of success with minimal usage of resources and finances. This presentation will highlight the procedures for assessing developability and also showcases the challenges associated with administering low-concentration biologics.

IBEC Seminar: Sabina Quader
2024-07-17 15:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Nanomedicine to Tackle Unmet Medical Needs in CNS Disorders
Sabina Quader, Innovation Center of NanoMedicine (iCONM), Kawasaki Institute of Industrial Promotion, Kawasaki, Kanagawa 210-0821 Japan
The brain is undoubtedly the body’s most essential and intricate organ, and brain disorders are closely tied to this intricacy. Categorized as “CNS diseases,” a wide range of brain-related conditions – including Alzheimer’s, dementia, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, stroke, brain tumors, and more – present daunting challenges. Regrettably, many of these diseases currently lack adequate treatment, underscoring the urgent need for innovative and multidimensional efforts to combat these persistent problems. In this regard, nanomedicine shows tremendous potential for diagnosing and treating many life-threatening diseases, including cardiovascular and genetic disorders, CNS diseases, and cancers1. The field of nanomedicine is constantly revolutionizing healthcare with innovative approaches to tackling severe health issues. However, it is also crucial to actively translate these novel approaches more effectively. In our laboratory at the Innovation Center of NanoMedicine (iCONM), we aim to effectively bridge innovation and translation. Our nanomedicine platform is based on polymeric micelles that are constructed from poly(ethylene glycol)-b-poly(amino acids) (PEG-PAA) copolymers and have already demonstrated significant promise through their clinical translation potential2. The PEG-PAA copolymers are highly biocompatible and have the unique ability to engineer versatile, dynamic covalent chemistry-based approaches to link the cargo with the carriers; this feature ultimately improves spatiotemporal control over drug release kinetics, which is one of the critical properties of drug-loaded nanocarriers, along with size and surface properties. In this presentation, optimal design features of nanomedicine will be discussed, focusing on treating CNS diseases, mainly brain cancers3,4. An overview of our Japan-Spain international collaborative research focused on drug delivery to hypothalamic neurons for tackling obesity will also be presented5.
References–

Quader and K. Kataoka*, Mol Ther, 25 (2017) 1501.
Cabral, K. Miyata, K. Osada, K. Kataoka*, Chem. Rev., 118 (2018) 6844.
Kinoh, S. Quader, H. Shibasaki, X. Liu, A. Maity, T. Yamasoba, H. Cabral*, K. Kataoka*,ACS Nano, 14 (2020) 10127.
Quader*, X. Liu, K. Toh, Y.-L. Su, A. R. Maity, A. Tao, W. K. D. Paraiso, Y. Mochida, H. Kinoh, H. Cabral, K. Kataoka*, Biomaterials, 267 (2021)120463.
J Garcia-Chica, WK D Paraiso, S Zagmutt, A Fosch, A Reguera, X Ariza, S Alzina, L Sanchez-Garcia, S Fukushima, K Toh, N Casals, D Serra, L Herrero, J Garcia, K Kataoka, X Ariza, S Quader*, R Rodriguez-Rodriguez*, Nanomedicine targeting brain lipid metabolism as a feasible approach for controlling the energy balance, Sci. 11 (2023) 2336-2346

Dr. Quader did her Ph.D. in Synthetic Organic Chemistry from Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia 2007. Following her Ph.D., she started working as a Research Chemist at Research Directions Pty Ltd, Brisbane, Australia. In 2010, she joined Professor Kazunori Kataoka’s world-renowned biomaterial research laboratory at the Materials Engineering Department of Tokyo University with a Japanese government -funded prestigious JSPS postdoctoral fellowship. After completing two years of JSPS fellowship, she continued her work at the same laboratory for another two years as Project Researcher. Since 2015, she has been an integral part of the Innovation Center of NanoMedicine (iCONM), Kawasaki, Japan, as a Senior Research Scientist and, as of 2023, as a Deputy Principal Research Scientist. Dr. Quader’s area of expertise lies in developing stimuli-sensitive nanomaterials tailored for targeted drug delivery to address challenging diseases. Dr. Quader is currently a principal investigator in multiple projects and overseeing international research activities at iCONM as Chief Coordinator of Global Partnership. One of her international collaborative research endeavors, “COnCorD,” was one of the three bilateral projects awarded by the Spanish State Agency for Research (AEI) and the Japanese Medical Research Agency (AMED) as a result of an invitation for joint project proposals from early-stage researchers in Japan and Spain in the “Nanomedicine” research area.

IBEC Seminar: Carlos Moreno Yruela
2024-07-19 10:00 - 11:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Semi-synthetic nucleosomes to stabilize and image enzyme-chromatin interactions
Carlos Moreno Yruela, Researcher in Chemical Biology, EPFL, Switzerland
Chromatin structure regulates gene expression and is tightly controlled by histone post-translational modifications. SIRT7 is a histone lysine deacylase found to maintain oncogenic gene expression profiles supporting tumor growth and
metastasis. Interestingly, the activity of SIRT7 is fully dependent on binding to nucleosomes within chromatin. This feature has limited the development of inhibitors and chemical probes to further dissect its role in cancer progression. Here, we develop nucleosome-based tools for structural characterization and high-throughput screening. Thanks to 2- and 3-fragment native chemical ligation methods, we introduced synthetic peptides into the structure of histone H3, to install either mechanism-based thiourea crosslinkers or fluorescence quenchers at the positions of known SIRT7 substrates. First, mechanism-based crosslinking nucleosomes allowed us to stabilize the interaction of SIRT7 with its nucleosome substrates and obtain structures by cryoEM. The different complexes revealed a multivalent and non-canonical nucleosome binding mechanism, and specific residues responsible for targeting different substrates within the nucleosome. Second, nucleosomes with acyllysine fluorescence quenchers and a neighboring fluorophore proved to be SIRT7-activated fluorogenic substrates and will be used for high-throughput screening and single-molecule biophysical characterization. All in all, we developed a strategy to stabilize enzyme-chromatin interactions for detailed structural studies, as well as a platform for the development of translatable SIRT7-targeting cancer therapeutics.

Carlos studied Chemistry at the University of Zaragoza and obtained his M.Sc. in Drug Discovery from the University of Surrey (UK). He obtained his Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from the University of Copenhagen in 2019, on the development of assays and chemical probes for histone deacetylases in the laboratory of Prof. Christian Adam Olsen. He stayed 3 more years in Copenhagen as postdoctoral fellow, working on the newly found lactyl-lysine modification of histones. In 2022, Carlos moved to EPFL Lausanne (Switzerland) thanks to a postdoctoral grant from the Independent Danish Research Council, where he uses protein semi-synthesis to generate complex in vitro systems for translatable biophysical studies and anticancer drug development. Carlos is now an independent postdoctoral fellow of the Swiss National Science Foundation.

IBEC Seminar: Prof Marcelle Machluf
2024-09-13 14:00 - 16:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Harnessing the power of stem cell therapy in an off-the-shelf nano-delivery platform for treating brain disorders
Prof Marcelle Machluf, Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Engineering, Technion, Haifa, Israel
Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have gained the most attention in cell therapy, owing to their ability to traverse physiological barriers, and target different sites of inflammation including neurological deseases and primary and metastatic tumors, while exhibiting relative allogeneic safety. However, once transplanted, MSCs undergo changes that alter their targeting capabilities and increase their immunogenicity, only permitting them to exert a short hit-and-run effect. We hypothesised that overcoming these challenges can be realised by combining the safety and inflamatory targeting capabilities of MSCs in an inanimate platform that can withstand limiting host influences. The foundations for this combination are laid by a novel class of nano-vesicles (200 nm), termed nano-ghosts (NGs), equipped with the membrane proteins of MSCs and can be engineered to express additional exogenous ones. The developed -cGMP compliant- technology for the production of NGs from the whole MSC membranes, allow us to load them with a diverse payloads and/or engineer them to express ligands that can combat brain tumors and neuroinflamatory deseas such as MS. Their abundance of natural targeting mechanisms allows the NGs, injected i.v., to bypass the BBB and penetrate the entire tumor bulk or inflamatory site, and rapidly deploy their payload directly into the targeted cells leading to unprecedented tumor growth inhibition and increased animals’ survival in intracranial glioma model. Surprising data also demonstrate that the NGs by themselves can modulate inflammation via cell-cell interaction and significaly reduce MS symtomes in EAE mice without any payload, paving the way for their use in other neuroinflamatory deseas such as Alzhimer and Parkinson. Thus, our results, so far, clearly demonstrate the translational potential of NGs, both as targeted delivery platform as well as a novel immunomodulatory biologic for brain diseass.

IBEC Seminar: Maria João Amorim
2024-09-18 12:00 - 13:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Advances in understanding and manipulating influenza A virus liquid inclusions
Maria João Amorim, PhD, Group Leader, Cell Biology of Viral Infection Lab, Católica Biomedical Research Centre, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, and Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência, Portugal
Many viruses form biomolecular condensates de novo as part of their replication programmes. Influenza A virus is an important human pathogen that has the genome divided into eight different RNA segments. Interestingly, each infectious particle contains no more than eight RNA segments and one of each type. Here, we show that during infection influenza forms liquid condensates named viral inclusions where the eight RNA segments accumulate. Viral inclusions are formed with a single RNA type, suggesting that these structures are formed before the genomic complex assembles and raises the hypothesis that these are specialized sites for the formation of influenza epidemic and pandemic genomic complexes. We will exchange views on why being liquid could constitute an interesting framework for understanding how influenza genomic complex forms. After, we will expose advances on how viral inclusions are formed and provide proof of the concept that condensate hardening blocks viral infection in cellula and in vivo. Since native or engineered transitions affect condensate behavior, phase transitions may offer novel antiviral opportunities for influenza, as well as for many other viruses that utilize biomolecular condensates during their lifecycle. Finally, we will show that our efforts to reconstitute in vitro influenza A virus inclusions give rise to a network of interactions built specifically during infection but, despite being dynamic, are not liquid but rather a gel-like state. We debate several hypothesis on why we have been unable for far to attain a liquid like character.

Animal welfare VS human welfare: To what extent do we want to protect them? (Spanish)
2024-09-25 18:00 - 19:00 | Biblioteca Gabriel García Marquez
Animal welfare VS human welfare: To what extent do we want to protect them?
The use of experimental animals is widely accepted within the scientific community and although there are differences in regulations between countries, they all follow the guidelines set by the 3Rs: Replace, Reduce and Refine. This event will be held in Spanish.

El uso de animales de experimentación está ampliamente aceptado dentro de la comunidad científica y a pesar de que hay diferencias en regulaciones entre países todos siguen las directrices que marcan las 3.os: Reemplazar, Reducir y Refinar. Por lo tanto, la primera pregunta que nos tenemos que hacer cuando estamos diseñando un experimento con animales es:
Podemos usar otro sistema que no involucre el uso de animales de experimentación para responder nuestra pregunta científica?
Afortunadamente esta pregunta cada vez es más fácil de responder gracias al desarrollo de sistemas biomimètics que imitan ciertos órganos como por ejemplo la piel, el intestino o el páncreas.
Proponemos la siguiente estructura para la mesa redonda:
Presentación
Exploración de la situación con los asistentes a través de preguntas:
• Qué impacto ha tenido durante la historia el uso de animales de experimentación?
• Qué nos motiva a reducir el uso de los animales de experimentación?
• Hasta qué punto estamos dispuestos a reducir su uso?
• Qué alternativas tenemos?
Lluvia de ideas: Buscamos soluciones
Antes que nada se explicarán las premisas por el buen funcionamiento de la lluvia de ideas. A continuación, exploraremos las opciones que tenemos para reemplazar el uso de animales de experimentación.
Con que nos quedamos?
Qué sueño las propuestas que entre todos los asistentes creemos que pueden tener más éxito?
Cierre
Ponentes: Marcel Sorribas Adriana González Anna Martínez y Daunis Xiomara Gislen Fernández Garibay Nuria Camarero (moderadora), del IBEC.
Para registrarse haz click aquí.

Emerging Leaders in Biomedicine Symposium
2024-09-26 09:00 - 17:00 | Vall d’Hebron, Barcelona, Spain
The second edition of the Emerging Leaders in Biomedicine Symposium will take place on September 26th, 2024 at the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology. This exceptional event is a collaborative effort between:

Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO)
Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute
Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC)
Institute of Molecular Biology of Barcelona (IBMB)
Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG)
University Pompeu Fabra, Department of Medicine and Life Science
Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona)
Institute of Biomedicine of the University of Barcelona (IBUB)

The primary objective of this symposium is to provide a platform for senior postdocs and junior principal investigators (PIs) to come together and receive valuable scientific and logistical support from the local scientific community.
During the symposium, we will host several short talk sessions, round tables, and networking opportunities, allowing you to showcase your research, share the challenges you face, present your scientific interests, and explore potential synergies and collaborations.
Registration closed.
Full programme here.

PhD Thesis Defense: Marco Vigo
2024-09-26 10:00 - 13:00 | Facultat de Medicina de la Universitat de Barcelona – Aula 4.1
Investigating therapeutic targeting to intercellular adhesion molecule 1 through epitope, isoform, and cross-reactivity selection

Author: Marco Vigo, Targeted Therapeutics and Nanodevices and Nanobioengineering group

Reading date: 26/09/2024
Reading time: 10:00

Reading place: Facultat de Medicina de la Universitat de Barcelona – Aula 4.1
If you want to join online, you can connect via Teams here.

17th IBEC Symposium
2024-10-21 15:00 - 2024-10-22 18:00 | AXA Auditorium, L'illa Diagonal, Av. Diagonal 547 , Barcelona, 08029
The 17th IBEC annual Symposium brings together high-profile international experts for an open forum for interdisciplinary discussions and networking. This year the symposium is dedicated to Bioengineering for emergent and advanced therapies, one of IBEC’s three major application areas.
Scientific community is invited to participate. Attendees from IBEC and abroad are welcome to present their research or projects in poster format. Moreover, some of these contributions will be selected by the scientific committee for an oral flash presentation.
POSTER SESSION
As a new initiative this year, the poster session will be held in a pre-symposium event on October 21st at Citilab.
The poster session will provide an opportunity to showcase your work to the IBEC community in a relaxed environment. We will also enjoy refreshments during the poster session.
SATELLITE EVENT
To bring our research closer to the society we have organized a satellite outreach session, where selected researchers will have the opportunity to present their poster to secondary school students. The best outreach speech will receive a prize, which will be awarded during the symposium. If you are interested in participating in this satellite activity, please select this option in the registration form.

For those interested in participating, our Strategy and Communication units will conduct a workshop to help you adapt your poster content for a secondary school. audience.

Information and registration here.

BMBC meeting
2024-10-24 16:00 - 18:30 | PRBB (Parc de Recerca Biomèdica de Barcelona), Ramon y Cajal Room
Please mark your calendars! The next BMBC meeting will be held on Thursday 24th of October 2024, from 4-6:30pm at PRBB, Ramon y Cajal Room.
When: Thursday, October 24th, 2024 at 16.00h
Where: PRBB, “Ramon y Cajal” Room (inner square)

Program (abstracts of the talks at the end this email)
16h – 16h30 Anna Aragay (Group Leader, IBMB-CSIC, Signaling Transduction Group, IBMB-CSIC) — G protein intracellular signaling: effects on mitochondria motility and mitophagy
16h30 – 17h Cristina González-Estévez (Senior Researcher, IBUB, Lecturer Serra Húnter, Lab planarian Barcelona, IBUB) — Autophagy and senescence as early events required for planarian regeneration
17h-17h30 —– Coffee Break ——
17h30-18h Nina Kostina (Senior Researcher, Bioinspired Interactive Materials and Protocellular Systems, IBEC) — Harnessing nature’s blueprints to design interactive synthetic cells.
18h-18h30 Deborah Naon (Postdoctoral fellow, Complex Metabolic Diseases and Mitochondria, IRB) — Alternative Splicing of Mfn2 modulates organelle morphology
You can also visit https://felixcampelo.wixsite.com/bmbc

nanoBio&Med2024
2024-11-05 08:00 - 2024-11-07 17:00 | Auditori Antoni Caparrós, PCB, Tower D, c/Baldiri Reixac 4-8, Barcelona, Spain
The nanoBio&Med2024 International Conference (www.nanobiomedconf.com) will take place in-person in Barcelona (Nov 05-07, 2024). This event is going to present again the most recent international developments in the field of Nanobiotechnology and Nanomedicine and will provide a platform for multidisciplinary communication, new cooperations and projects to participants from both science and industry.
The call for abstracts is currently open (deadline: September 13, 2024) and abstracts can be submitted online through the website.
Upcoming Deadlines
Abstract Submission (Oral request): September 13, 2024
Student Grant (Travel bursary) Request: September 13, 2024
Author Submission Acceptance Notification: September 16, 2024
Student Grant Notification: September 16, 2024
Early Bird Registration Fee: September 20, 2024
Abstract Submission (Poster request): September 20, 2024

The conference will offer during this week an impressive list of Invited, Keynote & Plenary speakers.

News, Updates and opportunities for funding at the European Research Council (ERC)
2024-11-07 15:00 - 16:30 | Sala Félix Serratosa – PCB, c/ Baldiri i reixac 10-12, Barcelona, Spain, 08028, Spain
News, Updates and opportunities for funding at the European Research Council (ERC)
András Badacsonyi, Scientific Officer European Research Council Executive Agency
The European Research Council (ERC is the premier European funding organisation for excellent frontier research. I was set up by the European Commission responding to a demand from the scientific community in 2007. The ERC’s mission is to encourage the highest quality research in Europe through competitive funding and to support investigator-driven frontier research across all fields, based on scientific excellence.
Through its long-term grants, it provides scientific freedom and financial stability to its grantees and the reputation of excellent research. ERC projects have led to more than 200’000 articles published in scientific journals, over 2’200 patents and other IPR applications, and ERC grantees founded or co-founded over 400 start-ups so far.
The presentation will introduce ERC, its grants and the evaluation process. I will explain the recently introduced changes in the evaluation and I will try to give some pragmatic advice to those who intend to apply for ERC funding. At the same time, I will also clarify some misunderstandings and incorrect information about ERC evaluations.

AGENDA
15:00-15:05 – Welcome
Commercialization & Communications Director PCB & Samuel Sánchez ICREA Professor and Group Leader Deputy Director for the Internationalization and Institutional relations IBEC.
15:05 – 16:00 – Seminar
News, updates and opportunities for funding at the ERC, Dr. András Badacsonyi, ERC Scientific Officer at the European Research Council Executive Agency.
16:00 – 16:20 Q&A session
Click here to register

Thematic Network Workshop: “AI for Bioengineering”
2024-11-08 09:00 - 13:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Thematic Network Workshop: “AI for Bioengineering”
Today, healthcare technology collects a huge amount of raw data whose interpretation and analysis are beyond human capabilities. AI integration into bioengineering and personalized medicine is crucial to allow complex data analysis, to enhance predictive models, to integrate multiscale data, and to automate tasks. These capabilities are vital for advancing biological understanding and disease management.
IBEC “Artificial Intelligence for Bioengineering” Thematic Network (NET-AI) aims to equip IBEC researchers with knowledge about the latest machine learning (ML) techniques for bioengineering and create a specialized ML toolkit tailored for IBEC’s needs. Through a series of designed workshops, NET-AI aims to address common challenges and integrate machine learning at IBEC.
The aim of this first workshop is to explore and share AI use cases and needs within IBEC groups. Each group will have the opportunity to present its AI use cases and needs. Groups willing to participate should prepare a brief presentation (10-15 min max). After the presentations, we will engage in an open discussion to exchange ideas and identify future opportunities for collaboration and workshops.

Join us to shape the next steps in AI for bioengineering together!
Workshop held in the framework of the IBEC Thematic Networks.

Programme
09:00 – Welcome and introduction
09:15 – Presentations by the network groups
10:30 – Coffee break
10:50 – Presentations by other IBEC groups
11:45 – Roundtable discussion
13:00 – Closure

Registrer here (mandatory)

IBEC Seminar: Slav Bagriantsev
2024-11-15 10:00 - 11:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
3D architecture and mechanism of touch detection in the Pacinian corpuscle
Slav Bagriantsev, Associate Professor of Cellular & Molecular Physiology, Yale School of Medicine, USA
Pacinian corpuscles are specialized mechanoreceptor end-organs that detect transient touch and high-frequency vibration in the skin and viscera of many vertebrates. Corpuscles have a complex cellular organization, which includes a mechanoreceptor afferent surrounded by lamellar Schwann cells (LSCs) and several layers of outer core cells. How these components contribute to the sensory tuning of Pacinian corpuscles is unclear. We used Focused Ion Beam Scanning Electron Microscopy (FIB-SEM) to determine the detailed 3D architecture of an entire Pacinian corpuscle, including all corpuscular components, and utilized electrophysiology to reveal the contribution of each component to touch detection. In the prevailing model, the multilayered outer core serves as a mechanical filter that limits static and low-frequency stimuli from reaching the afferent terminal—the presumed sole site of touch detection in corpuscles. We show that the outer core is dispensable for the sensory tuning of Pacinian corpuscles to transient touch and high-frequency vibration; instead, these properties arise from the inner core. We show that LSCs express mechanically gated ion channels and form a gap junction-coupled syncytium around the afferent terminal. By acting as additional touch sensors, LSCs potentiate mechanosensitivity of the terminal, which detects touch via fast inactivating ion channels. We present a new model, in which the functional tuning of Pacinian corpuscles is enabled by an interplay between mechanosensitive LSCs and the afferent terminal in the inner core.

IBEC Seminar: Benoît Ladoux
2024-11-19 14:30 - 16:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Mechanical imprints of cell fate and cell competition
Benoît Ladoux, Institut Jacques Monot (IJM) Paris
Epithelia are communities of cells with close intercellular communications and of highly ordered coordination in their motion.
Mechanical properties of epithelial tissues are important for our understanding of many vital biological processes, including homeostasis, morphogenesis, and metastasis and are tightly regulated by cell-cell interactions. I will present examples highlighting the importance of mechanical forces during cell extrusion and cell competition. In the first part, I will focus on how cell extrusion and the fate of extruding cells from epithelial tissues can be determined by mechanical stresses. In the second part, I will show how cell competition, a mechanism by which the expansion of one cell population leads to the elimination of another, can be governed by the transmission of intercellular forces. Throughout the talk, I’ll discuss the close links between mechanics and cell biology, as well as possible analogies between physical and biological systems.

IBEC Seminar: Raül Andero Galí
2024-11-28 12:00 - 13:30 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Translating fear mechanisms between humans and mice
Raül Andero Galí, PhD, ICREA Research Professor at the Institute of Neurosciences of the Autonomous University of Barcelona
Sex-specific mechanisms in fear memory and extinction may explain certain neuropsychiatric disorders like Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). In male mice, chemogenetic silencing of centromedial amygdala (CeM)-Tac2 fibers in the lateral posterior part of the Bed Nucleus of the Stria Terminalis (BNSTpl) impaired fear memory, while optogenetic excitation enhanced inhibitory postsynaptic currents. In vivo calcium imaging in freely moving mice revealed a sex-dimorphic fear memory engram in the BNSTpl. In humans, the TAC3R single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) (rs2765) reduced CeM-BNST connectivity and impaired fear memory in men but not women. In a different study, female mice subjected to acute stress exhibited fear extinction impairments linked to hypothalamic Pacap and Pac1R upregulation. Similar fear extinction deficits were observed in women with PTSD carriers of the PAC1R SNP (rs2267735). Together, these studies highlight sex-differences in neural circuits regulating fear memory, which may influence vulnerability to PTSD.
Please contact Silvia Pittolo if you would like to meet the speaker: spittolo@ibecbarcelona.eu

Complementary Skills Session: "Science: Comedy and Communication"
2024-11-29 10:00 - 11:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Science: Comedy and Communication
Dr Matthew Murtha, https://drmurtha.com/
Dr Matthew Murtha earned his PhD at Ohio State University where his work contributed to several therapies that have passed clinical trials. He completed post-docs at NYU and IBIDELL where his pioneering functional genomics techniques were used to investigate molecular causes of autism. He has since left the lab to devote himself full time to science communication.
In his talk, a combination of stand up and story telling, he’ll talk about how he came to be a scientist and then communicator and will give some tips on how to communicate sciecne and make it more understandable and attractive for a non-scientific audience.

PhD Discussion: Anna Panteleeva and Miguel Gonzalez Martin
2024-12-13 10:00 - 11:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Advancing Neurodegenerative Disease Research with Enhanced Brain-on-a-Chip Technology and Integrated Biosensor Systems
Anna Panteleeva – Nanobioengineering
Neurodegenerative disorders (NDDs), such as Alzheimer’s disease, remain a critical global health challenge. A key obstacle in drug development is the blood-brain barrier (BBB), which plays a crucial role in regulating the exchange of substances between the bloodstream and the brain. While the BBB protects the brain, its dysfunction contributes to NDD progression, and it hinders drug delivery, leaving most therapeutic candidates unsuccessful in clinical trials.
Traditional animal models have provided valuable insights into NDDs, but they fall short in fully replicating the complexity of human neural responses. Brain-on-a-chip (BoC) technology has emerged as a promising tool, offering controlled environments to study neuronal networks. Integrating a BBB component into BoC systems significantly enhances their physiological relevance, enabling the study of complex BBB properties.
Our research advances BoC technology by combining a microfluidic device, multi-electrode array (MEA) technology and biosensors to create a comprehensive BBB model. By co-culturing endothelial cells, pericytes, astrocytes, and neurons, we replicate key BBB elements and neural interactions. This setup allows real-time monitoring of BBB permeability and neural activity via MEA electrodes, and neuronal degradation using biosensors. Preliminary results demonstrate promising outcomes, though further optimization is required.
This innovative approach improves the physiological relevance of BoC systems and accelerates drug development and personalized therapies for NDDs, providing a pathway toward more effective treatments.
Designing synthetic mechanosensitive molecules for the mechanical control of cellular transcription
Miguel Gonzalez Martin – Cellular and Molecular Mechanobiology
Cells sense mechanical signals in the process of mechanotransduction, activating pathways that govern cell behavior. However, it remains a challenge to engineer mechanotransduction pathways in a controllable and predictable manner. Here we aim to engineer a synthetic mechanosensitive transcription factor (msTTA). To this end, we exploit the force induced changes in nuclear transport, linking nuclear mechanical perturbations to gene expression. To do so, we are mechanically tuning the passive and facilitated transport properties of the synthetic msTTA. Through this we aim to recapitulate the localization behavior of endogenous mechanosensitive proteins such as YAP or Twist, but with a synthetic factor that activates genes of choice in a controlled way. Optimizing our reporter cells, we have set up a novel screening platform with substrates of different rigidity, from which we expect to identify highly mechanosensitive TF candidates that function in a tunable manner, as well as to elucidate which features make a transcription factor mechanosensitive. Overall, we expect to unlock precise transcriptional control through mechanical forces, and a state-of-the-art directed evolution platform for msTTAs. With the simplicity of this engineered regulatory module, we expect to describe the minimal elements of mechano-regulation of gene expression, as well as enabling the use of mechanotransduction in gene circuits control. This will open the field to use mechanotransduction approaches for complex synthetic biology applications.

PhD Thesis Defence: Betsy Verónica Arévalo Jaimes
2024-12-13 10:00 - 14:00
Biofilms microbianos: virulencia e interacciones hongo-bacteria
Betsy Verónica Arévalo Jaimes, Bacterial infections and Antimicrobial Therapies group
This thesis defence will take place at the Aula de Grados de la Facultad de Biología de la Universidad de Barcelona.
Friday 13th December at 10:00h

IBEC Seminar: Prof. Yuval Ebenstein
2024-12-17 15:00 - 16:00 | Sala Dolors Aleu, Cluster II, IBEC, Baldiri i Reixac, Barcelona
Beyond NGS: A toolbox for single-molecule epigenetic analysis of DNA
Prof. Yuval Ebenstein, Department of Physical Chemistry, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Founder, Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center Tel Aviv University, Israel.
DNA sequencing (NGS) is revolutionizing all fields of biological research. Still, it fails to extract the full range of information associated with genetic material and cannot resolve important variations between genomes. The information content of the genome extends beyond the base sequence in the form of chemical modifications such as DNA methylation or chromosomal association with DNA-binding proteins (chromatin). For the last decade, my lab has been developing tools for genomic analysis at the single-cell and single-molecule levels. I will show how the physical extension of long DNA molecules in nanofluidic channels reveals this information in the form of a linear, optical, or electrical “barcode,” like beads threaded on a string, where each bead represents a distinct type of observable. I’ll present a biochemical and physical toolbox for mapping epigenetic modifications in the genome and demonstrate its application in clinical cancer research. Finally, I will talk about a DNA chip developed in the lab and the adventure of building a startup based on this technology.

Short Bio:
Prof. Yuval Ebenstein is a scientist and entrepreneur with years of experience in translational research. Yuval is head of the NanoBioPhotonix Lab and the founder of the Tel Aviv University Entrepreneurship Center. In his lab, Yuval combines Chemistry, Physics, Biology, and bioinformatics in order to study the human genome. His lab explores genomes utilizing tools and reagents from the realm of nano-technology, zooming in on single cells, single chromosomes, and single molecules. Yuval is the winner of two ERC awards for developing genomic technologies and is the founder of JaxBio, a liquid biopsy methylation-based diagnostics startup.
