European Campus of Excellence summer school in Portugal!
This summer, international students and leading scientists will be heading to Portugal where a prestigious summer school in genome biology and evolution is about to get under way. From 1 to 18 August, the European Campus of Excellence (ECE) Genome Biology and Evolution summer school will be held in Portugal's Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC); this is the first visit to the Iberian Peninsula for the summer school. The aim of the event is to bring together talented European graduate students and Europe's top scientists. The decade-long effort to sequence the human genome that came to an end in 2000 changed how scientists study biomedicine and biotechnology; it paved the way to unravelling the genetic bases of complex diseases and to a new, personalised medicine. Since this landmark moment, researchers worldwide have been able to decode the genetic blueprint of thousands of organisms, something that can lead to the discovery of new antibiotics, cancer drugs, functional foods and other biotechnological applications. However, more work needs to be done to ensure that scientists' capacity to annotate, organise and interpret genetic data is up to speed with the fast pace of new genome information being produced annually. This is one of the aims of the summer school. José Pereira Leal, group leader at the IGC and one of the summer school's organisers comments: 'We need to train a new generation of scientists that are fluent in biology, computer science and maths, to harness the promise of the genomic era. The summer school is an important step in that direction.' ECE is a Europe-wide system that offers disciplinary as well as interdisciplinary courses for European students at different university education levels from all university disciplines. The courses concentrate on topics that are of great importance for the welfare of European citizens, as well as scholarly and scientifically challenging. ECE is also a means of ensuring Europe keeps up with other world-leading research areas such as China, India and the United States. Funded by the Volkswagen Foundation (Germany) and the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (Portugal), the Genome Biology and Evolution summer school will see 40 students (selected from over 100 applicants hailing from 15 European countries) meet with some of the world's top scientists in the field. One notable name on the line-up is Sydney Brenner from the Salk Institute in the United States, who won the Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine 2002. Dr Indra Willms-Hoff, Member of the Executive Management at the Volkswagen Foundation, believes the school will be a 'major step forward in fostering the exchange of ideas amongst students from different disciplines and with different nationalities, thus contributing to a truly European scientific experience'. Eduardo Marçal Grilo, trustee of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, says: 'This joint initiative of the two Foundations (Volkswagen and Gulbenkian) is an extremely important project aiming to create a network of Excellence, covering different fields of science, based on talented students and leading research institutions who can contribute to consolidate a Knowledge society in Europe. Europeans must be prepared to invest in their very qualified young generation in order to achieve levels of excellence which enable them to compete at international level'.For more information, please visit:Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência:http://www.igc.gulbenkian.pt/
Countries
Portugal