Group leader
This advance can help in predicting treatment efficiency thus, avoiding tumor resistance and decreasing undesired secondary effects.
The Catalan Government announced yesterday the Narcís Monturiol Medal award for scientific and technological merit to the Director of the IBEC, Josep Samitier Martí, for his contribution to the development of the Catalan system of science and technology. In total, ten researchers from the Catalan knowledge system (six men and four women) have received this distinction, as well as a research center that has been awarded the Narcís Monturiol Plaque, which recognizes an institution in the country.
An international team, led by Profs Giuseppe Battaglia and Loris Rizzello from the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), carried out out a study that opens the door to a new therapy capable of quickly and effectively eliminating infections caused by intracellular bacteria, the most resistant to immune defenses. This therapy, based on synthetic vesicles, could considerably reduce the dose and duration of antimicrobial treatments, thus reducing the danger of generating resistance to antibiotics of pathogens such as those leading to tuberculosis.
The Mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, visited IBEC facilities last Friday to learn, by our Director and a group of researchers, how bioengineering can help find solutions to health problems such as COVID19, cancer, or degenerative diseases.When in early 2020, more than 200 scientists gathered in La Pedrera in Barcelona to discuss the present and future of bioengineering, no one imagined that the world would experience the first pandemic of the 21st century and that science would take on more importance than ever.
On May 13, the new National Agreement for a Knowledge-based Society was presented at the appearance of the President of the Catalan Government and the Minister for Business and Knowledge. This pact proposes the public policies that would have to be carried out so that Catalonia to becomes a leader in research and innovation at the international level.
IBEC contributes to elucidate how the rigidity of the tumor extracellular matrix affects the aggressiveness of neuroblastoma, a cancerous tumor that affects mainly children. This opens the door to generate more accurate models to predict tumor development in patients and to work in the design of new treatments. Neuroblastoma is the most frequent malignant tumor in the first year of life. It is caused by a genetic mutation from immature nerve cells (neuroblasts) that the fetus produces as part of its development process.
The Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) will contribute its extensive experience in 3D printing and bioprinting to the BASE 3D community, an entity that brings together research centers and companies from all over Catalonia with the aim of promoting R+D+i in the field of printing 3D.The groups led by Josep Samitier, Elisabeth Engel, Núria Montserrat and Javier Ramón at IBEC are joining the BASE3D project.
Experts at Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) led by Josep Samitier, the Director of the Institute, have contributed to an international project supported by the European Union to study red blood cells under realistic physiological conditions.