WEBINAR: Lecture series Cancer Research: "Translating the Science of Gliomas: Current Concepts & Future Challenges" - Prof Colin Watts

High blood pressure (HBP) or hypertension is often called the ‘‘silent killer’’, due to the lack of obvious symptoms indicating its presence. It is therefore important to be able to self-monitor one’s blood pressure and understand how to interpret the measurements. To this end, the Cardiovascular Research Unit (CVRU) of the LIH Department of Population Health (DoPH) recently published an informative brochure to help shed light into cardiovascular health.

The Tumor Immunotherapy and Microenvironment (TIME) research group of the LIH Department of Oncology (DONC) teamed up with Swedish Pharma company Sprint Bioscience to investigate the therapeutic benefit of small molecules inhibiting key pathways in cancer cells. The aim is to potentiate the effectiveness of immunotherapy and providing innovative and translational approaches to treating several cancers.

Researchers from the Department of Infection and Immunity of the Luxembourg Institute of Health (LIH) brought forward the potential of high doses of a specific adjuvant molecule, namely CpG oligonucleotide, in successfully modulating the immune system’s allergic response to the main cat allergen Fel d 1, thereby inducing a tolerance-promoting reaction and reverting the main hallmarks of cat allergy. The researchers analysed the molecular mechanisms underlying this tolerance and proposed a pre-clinical allergen-specific immunotherapy approach to improve the treatment and control of this common type of allergy. The full study results were published very recently in the renowned international journal “Allergy”, the official journal of the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (EAACI) and one of the top two journals worldwide in the allergy field.

On January 27th, the Global Observatory for Physical Activity (GoPA!) released its second round of physical activity country profiles, presenting detailed information on physical activity research, policy and surveillance in 162 countries across the world. The Physical Activity, Sport and Health research group of the LIH Department of Population Health (DoPH) was the point of contact for the 2020 Country Card for Luxembourg, contributing with the data and information generated through past population studies in order to give an overview of the country’s performance in this domain.

The LIH is looking for highly motivated outstanding candidates with a strong interest in high dimensional health- or biology- related data analysis to establish a research team and run a dedicated service platform in relevant fields of interest. The focus of the core facility will be to support the current research demand of all LIH departments which are active in the field of cancer, immunologic diseases, and digital and precision public  health. Candidates should have a strong background in at least one of the following fields: Bioinformatics, Omics-data analysis, NGS, Tumour Genomics, Artificial Intelligence, System Biology (e.g:Image based system biology), single cell technologies (e.g.: transcriptomicsand proteomics),  Big Data for health and programming. Overall, candidates should be able to demonstrate knowledge with Algorithmic, Mathematical, Ontological and Statistical concepts with medical research applications. The applicants should be driven to take a leading role in expanding the research activities at LIH including supervision of Postdocs and PhD students and the acquisition of external funding for novel and innovative research collaborations. Candidates at all career level are invited to apply. Actual positions will be adapted  to candidate profile.

On February 1st, the new i2TRON (Integrating immune strategies for Translational Research in Oncology and Neurology) research and training programme for PhD candidates officially started. Its overarching goal is to develop the ability of doctoral candidates to successfully translate fundamental research findings into innovative pre-clinical and clinical applications, thereby contributing to shaping the next generation of translational researchers and to developing advanced medicine and care.

The field of proteomics, i.e. the characterisation of the complete pool of proteins produced by a cell, is acquiring increasing importance in understanding the onset of various diseases and devising new personalised treatments. At LIH, this area is being explored by Prof Gunnar Dittmar and his team at the Proteomics of Cellular Signaling research group of the Quantitative Biology Unit (QBU). His work has resulted in the publication of his 100th scientific paper in the January 2021 issue of the prestigious international journal “Analytical Chemistry”. In this interview, Prof Dittmar discusses his expertise and research focus.