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Josep Samitier

Group leader

IBEC receives a visit from the Mayor of Barcelona interested in our research against Covid19

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.

IBEC’s director contributes to the new National Agreement for a Knowledge-based Society

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.

Bioengineering contributes to new advances against childhood cancer

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.

IBEC joins the BASE3D community to contribute to the future of 3D printing

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.

Joan Montero and colleagues in Boston suggest a new strategy for melanoma patients

IBEC researcher Joan Montero authors a paper in Nature Communications which uncovers a key adaptation that melanoma cancer cells use to evade current therapies. This finding might allow physicians to use better drug combinations to improve patient outcomes in the future.

Despite significant advances in cancer diagnosis and treatment, most targeted cancer therapies fail to achieve complete tumor regressions or durable remission. Understanding why these treatments are not always efficient has remained a main challenge for researchers and physicians. Now, Joan Montero from the IBEC and colleagues at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Harvard Medical School in USA report in Nature Communications a mechanism that uncovers why some therapies fail to treat melanoma.

Josep Samitier and Núria Montserrat at the “Engineering and Manufacture of Living Systems” workshop in China

Last 9-11th of October took place in Beijing the workshop on “Engineering and Manufacture of Living Systems”. The aim of the workshop was to bring together multi-disciplinary researchers to review the latest advances and discuss the future directions in the design and manufacture of engineered living systems, and their integration amongst the researchers gathered at this international workshop.

The major topics discussed during the workshop were: to consider issues related to translation of engineered living systems from the laboratory to the clinic and to industry, review enabling and emerging techniques for using pluripotent cells from various sources such as cell spheroids, organoids and organs-on-a-chip, discuss the ethical, societal and regulatory issues associated with the development and manufacture of engineered living systems and envision future research, development and synergies at the integration and interface of biomanufacturing and engineering living systems amongst others. The meeting was organised by Tsinghua University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

IBEC and EMBL join forces

The European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) aim to strengthen future collaboration between the two research institutions. With this purpose, IBEC Director’s Josep Samitier and Edith Heard, Director of EMBL, have signed a 5-year agreement at EMBL Barcelona headquarters.

This collaboration is the beginning of a working framework for activities between EMBL and IBEC which support strategic long-term scientific and general collaboration in areas of mutual interest. Some of the proposed join projects are a postdoc EMBL-IBEC program and a series of EMBL-IBEC seminars. Moreover, it is also planned to reinforce visitors’ exchange whereby scientific personnel affiliated to EMBL or IBEC will have the possibility to visit the facilities of the other institution in order to study research developments and techniques and to foster interdisciplinary collaborations.

IBEC obtains a second Severo Ochoa accreditation for Excellence

The Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia is one of the six centres in Spain to be awarded accreditation in this round of the Severo Ochoa Excellence programme. Furthermore, IBEC is the only center that receives this accreditation for the second time.

The Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities published yesterday the results of the winners of this distinction, selected by an international panel of a hundred judges, for its scientific results and strategic programmes.

Severo Ochoa Excellence Awards identify and promote public research centres and units in Spain that stand out as international references in their specialized fields

IBEC Director Josep Samitier expressed his gratitude for the award and highlights that: “the obtention of the Severo Ochoa accreditation for the second time satisfies us greatly because it recognizes the leadership and excellence of IBEC activities both in research and in translation of the obtained results to society”.