By Heather Hobbs BRINGING YOU THE LATEST RESEARCH & EVENTS NEWS FROM THE SCIENCE INDUSTRY


Consortium to Develop RNAi Screening Through Micropatterning Techniques


An SME driven project involving academic and industrial partners aims to combine high throughput applications of RNAi with new technology for normalising cultured cells’ behaviour by growing them on adhesive micropatterns. The MEHTRICS consortium, which has been awarded a €4 million research grant over three years under the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Program includes CYTOO, a company specialising in micro- pattern enhanced cell-based assays and Cenix BioScience, developers of HT screening applications of RNAi. Academic partners are from the Heidelberg, Germany-based Bioquant/Heidelberg University teams of Drs Ulrich Schwarz and Holger Erfle, the Lausanne, Switzerland-based EPFL team of Dr Pierre Gönczy and the Vilnius, Lithuania-based Institute FTMC


team of Dr. Ramunas Valiokas. The cross-disciplinary team, covering areas from chemistry and nanotechnology to HT cell biology, pharmacology, automated image analysis and mathematical modelling, will work on optimising micropattern- enhanced cell-based assays with a very broad range of applicability. Ultimately, the proof of principle for these methodologies will include several test-scale RNAi screens focused on basic and disease-relevant processes.


“Initial studies of our technology‘s genuinely transformational potential have already begun to reveal its promise for enhancing the quality of existing high content analyses and its potential for establishing novel strategies driving such analyses,” said Alexandra Fuchs, Chief Operating Officer of CYTOO.


“Since experimental designs required for RNAi screens are among the most demanding of all HT/HC studies in cultured cells, encompassing virtually all technical challenges also encountered in compound screens, we expect the proposed scope of activities to deliver the maximal potential for impactful innovation, widespread adoption and clear relevance for all major applications of HT/HC cell screening, from RNAi to miRNA modulation to analyses of drug action,” added Dr Christophe Echeverri, Chief Executive Officer/Chief Scientific Officer of Cenix.


The consortium’s administrative and financial activities will be coordinated by VITAMIB, a well-established French SME specialised in design and management of collaborative research projects.


Find out more circle no. 4 Computational Modelling


for Biotechnology A new European joint effort aimed at developing new computational tools to integrate and analyse the large amounts of data arising in biology and biotechnology with the final goal to improve biotechnological processes and applications, was announced during December. The BioPreDyn project - coordinated by the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) in Barcelona - includes eight academic labs and three industrial partners from countries all across Europe. It is a three-year project with a budget of €2.9 million from the 7th Framework Program of the European Commission. The BioPreDyn Project (New Bioinformatics Methods and Tools for Data-Driven, Predictive Dynamic Modelling in Biotechnological Applications), aims to develop novel computational tools, methods and algorithms, for integration into a user- friendly software platform for research institutions and the biotech sector. Biological systems studied in the lab and specific biotechnological applications will be used as benchmark problems to develop these new approaches.


Julio R. Banga, CSIC researcher, in Vigo and one of the scientific coordinators of the project, emphasised that: "BioPreDyn presents a holistic approach to model building in bioinformatics and systems biology, targeting both fundamental theory and real-world applications." His colleague and co-coordinator Johannes Jaeger, from the Centre for Genomic Regulation, in Barcelona, pointed out that the project is indispensable as it "aims at creating an integrated suite of robust and solid methods to empower data-driven modelling for the systems biology and biotechnology of the future, shortening the lag time ‘from ideas to the market’.”


Find out more circle no. 5


Research on Dendrites Wins 2011 Eppendorf & Science Prize


The Portuguese scientist, Tiago Branco MD PhD, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at University College London has won the 2011 Eppendorf & Science Prize for Neurobiology for his research on dendrites. His work shows how dendrites discriminate temporal input sequences and apply different integration rules depending on input location. These findings give insight on how the brain performs the computations that underlie behaviour, and suggest that even single neurons can solve complex computational tasks.


Dr Branco wrote: “Animal survival depends on the ability to analyse the environment and act upon it. This requires processing information from the outside world and using it to produce an appropriate behaviour. How does the brain do this? Information arrives at neurons in the form of synaptic input delivered to dendrites protrusions from the cell body separating the input from the output zone. My studies have shown that the properties of dendrites might be used by single neurons to integrate information and perform specific computations. In particular, I focused on the ability of dendrites to discriminate between different temporal sequences of input, a fundamental computation for successfully interacting with a dynamic environment.” Using a laser to activate synapses with precise spatial and temporal control, Dr Branco has


Dr Tiago Branco


shown that the presence of a special type of glutamate receptor allows dendrites to efficiently discriminate multiple input sequences. This combination of electro- physiological, optical and modelling techniques has advanced our understanding of how dendritic integration contributes to single neuron computations. In his future work, Dr Branco plans to combine this approach with molecular methods to investigate the role of dendrites in controlling animal behaviour.


Dr Axel Jahns at Eppendorf headquarters in Hamburg, said: “Sponsored jointly by Eppendorf and the journal Science, this international US$ 25,000 prize is open to scientists of 35 years of age or younger who have made outstanding contributions to neurobiological research using molecular


and cell biology methods.” Dr Branco was selected as the tenth winner of the prize by a committee of distinguished scientists chaired by Dr Peter Stern, Senior Editor of Science. Dr Branco was awarded the Prize at a special anniversary gala dinner for over 80 guests held at the AAAS/Science Headquarters in Washington D.C. on November 13, 2011. The next deadline for applications for the Eppendorf & Science Prize for Neurobiology is June 15, 2012. For more information about Dr Branco and the Prize, visit www.eppendorf.com/prize.


Find out more circle no. 6 Key Peptides Point to Universal Flu Vaccine


Researchers at the University of Southampton, University of Oxford and Retroscreeen Virology Ltd have discovered a series of peptides, found on the internal structures of influenza viruses that could lead to the development of a universal vaccine for influenza, one that gives people immunity against all strains of the disease, including seasonal, avian, and swine flu.


The scientific collaboration used a research method* known as ‘Human Viral Challenge Studies’, where healthy volunteers are infected with influenza virus, and their immune responses closely monitored in an isolation unit. Researchers discovered that the immune systems produced various types of T-cells (part of the immune system that kills both viral particles, and cells infected with viral particles). Notably, the T-cells responded to peptides associated with the internal structures of the influenza viruses.


Unlike the external structures of influenza virus, that mutates very rapidly and creates a new strain of virus most years, the internal structures change very slowly over a long period of time. These internal structures are found in all strains of influenza virus - thus, a vaccine that targets such peptides may provide immunity against all strains of influenza, including seasonal (yearly), avian (bird), and swine flu, for many years.


A vaccine against these peptides would activate the T-cell immune response – which is able to respond much more rapidly than vaccines that activate an antibody response.


Dr Tom Wilkinson, Senior Lecturer in Respiratory Medicine at the University of Southampton, who led the study, said: “Influenza is a virus that we know has a global impact, and the threat of further pandemics is a real one. Most influenza vaccines only


protect us against known influenza strains by creating antibodies in the blood but the influenza virus has the ability to rapidly change itself and new strains can emerge which rapidly spread across the globe by escaping this immunity.


“We have found that there is an important role for T-cells that recognise the flu virus, which if harnessed could protect against most or even all strains of seasonal and pandemic flu. Through this discovery we hope to improve vaccines for future strains of influenza; and potentially protect against the next pandemic. However there is more to do to translate these findings into new approaches to treatment.” The study was funded by the University of Southampton, the MRC and Retroscreen Virology Limited.


*published online in Nature Medicine Find out more circle no. 7


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92