Congratulations to EPIC-XS member Paola Picotti on being elected as an EMBO member 2022.

The European Molecular Biology Organisation EMBO announced that it elected 67 new members (EMBO press release). Huge congratulations to EPIC-XS member, Paola Picotti, group leader at the Institute of Molecular Systems Biology at the Department of Biology. Through this lifelong honour, new EMBO Members and Associate Members are recognized for their outstanding achievements in the life sciences. Link to the Picotti lab.

Utrecht University’s Hecklab visualises how the best antibodies to combat diseases can be found in our own bodies.

When art meets science, and hyperflexible dancing bodies meet their hyperflexible antibodies! Inspired by recent research from Utrecht University’s Hecklab and realized in collaboration with video artists from Sensu and performers from the Aerialettes, this artist impression visualises how the best antibodies to combat diseases can be found in our own bodies.

What if we could discover which antibody fights which threat the best, and turn these antibodies into biotherapeutics? We could then use them to treat patients who are not making the right antibodies; a cure that stems from within our own body.

This video was made in conjunction with research work published in Cell Systems, Sept. 2021.

Technology Networks Online Journal  – Proteomics editorial 2022

Advances in proteomics

Discover the role of EPIC-XS in “democratization” in the proteomics field.

Proteomics – the study of the proteome – is a constantly evolving field. It offers a global understanding of the molecular processes that underpin biological states across cells, tissues and whole organisms. Various areas of scientific research, including human, animal and plant biology, personalized medicine and forensics, are benefiting from rapid progress, which is largely attributed to advancements in proteomics technologies, data handling capabilities and data sharing. In this article, we will explore some of the recent advances in proteomics and their potential wider impact. Read more here

EU-backed scientists now know how certain proteins could potentially damage the body’s own cells.

CORDIS journalists have recently covered a project with Utrecht University researchers Marie Lukassen, Franc Vojtech and Albert J. R. Heck together with Dr Doryen Bubeck’s group (Imperial College London) based on public information available online. The News article has just been published on the CORDIS website in six languages at:  https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/435567-shedding-more-light-on-how-the-body-controls-our-immune-systems?WT.mc_id=exp

HUPO 2021 Discovery in proteomic sciences award

Dr. Paola Picotti was bestowed the Discovery in Proteomic Sciences Award as she developed a novel proteomic method to probe protein structural changes on a proteome-wide scale and directly from cell and tissue extracts. For the first time, the approach couples limited proteolysis and mass spectrometry (LiP-MS) to generate structure-specific proteolytic fingerprint (structural barcodes) for each protein. Dr. Picotti applied LiP-MS to elucidate the determinants of thermosensitivity of proteomes, which challenged previous textbook knowledge on the prevalence of intrinsically disordered proteins. Further, Dr. Picotti used LiP-MS to generate the first map of protein-metabolite interactions, which revealed structural and functional principles of chemical communication. Read more here.

Lifetime APMA achievement award in proteomics 2021

We are happy to announce that this year Karl Mechtler received the APMA Lifetime Award and is now eligible to bear the title Prof. h.c. (APMA). Karl was a co-founder of the Austrian Proteomics Association and was long time a board member of the European Proteomics Society (EuPA). The innovations and the research he and his group have worked on in the last decades have had a great impact on the Proteomics community and he is a renowned member of this society all over the world.

Prestigious Highly Cited Researchers 2021

Huge congratulations to Albert Heck (UU), Bernhard Kuster (TUM), Juan-Antonio Vizcaino (EMBL-EBI), Jesper Olsen (UCPH) and Matthias Mann (UCPH) who have been recognized as true pioneers in their field and listed in the top 1% by citations for the production of multiple highly cited papers by the prestigious Clarivate Analytics. For the full list click here.

Structural proteomics method, breakthrough of the year in Falling Walls Competition 2021

Winner Life Sciences, Paola Picotti and Valentina Cappelletti (ETH Zürich)

Huge congratulations to the Picotti lab, which has developed a technology that generates a new type of molecular data with which researchers can look at the structures (or shapes) of the proteins in living systems. Scientists can do this in healthy systems or in diseased ones, in organisms as simple as a bacterium or as complex as a human, and they can look simultaneously at thousands of proteins. To find out more click here.

CEITEC Masaryk University, at the 11th International Conference Analytical Cytometry, Czech Republic.

PROTEOMIC ANALYSIS IDENTIFIES KEY PLAYERS IN THE PROCESS OF METASTASIS UNDER HYPOXIC CONDITIONS

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Albert Heck awarded the Wallace H. Coulter Lectureship

Utrecht University professor Albert Heck has been awarded the Wallace H. Coulter Lectureship.

Heck receives the prestigious lectureship for his scientific impact and multiple breakthroughs. This prestigious lectureship comprises a $10.000 award and the main plenary lecture at Pittcon.

Continue reading..

European Proteomics Infrastructure Consortium –
Providing Access

Find out what the users think and why proteomics insights have so many applications.

Protein Researcher Receives KFJ Prize

Professor Jesper Velgaard Olsen from the University of Copenhagen has received one of two KFJ Awards for the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences. He is honoured for his significant contribution to high-tech protein mapping using mass spectrometry.

View the full release here.

https://www.technologynetworks.com/tn/product-news/new-collaboration-aims-to-develop-ms-methods-for-studying-protein-structures-and-interactions-338844

Prestigious Award For Pioneer of Proteomics

In this anniversary year, the Marcel Benoist Swiss Science Prize, often referred to as the Swiss Nobel Prize, goes to Rudolf Aebersold (ETH Zurich/University of Zurich) for his pioneering work in the field of systems biology.

View the full release here.

Further details can be found at: https://ethz.ch/en/news-and-events/eth-news/news/2020/09/prestigious-award-for-pioneer-of-proteomics.html

Utrecht University and Bruker Announce Collaboration to Develop Methods for Studying Protein Structures and Interactions by Mass Spectrometry.

The laboratory of Albert Heck at Utrecht University has been a leader in proteomics and the study of protein structure and interactions by mass spectrometry for over two decades.

The group of Richard Scheltema specifically focuses on crosslinking mass spectrometry (XL-MS) for structural and interaction proteomics. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200807005095/en/

Paola Picotti is Rössler Prize Laureate 2020

The Rössler Prize is a special honour for promising young scientists in the middle of an accelerating career and is financed by the ETH Zürich Foundation since 2009 based on a generous endowment by Dr Rössler.

Paola will donate part of the prize to corona related research.

EPIC-XS members receive lifetime honour of EMBO membership

EPIC-XS member Kathryn Lilley (Cambridge University, UK) and EPIC-XS SAB member Anne-Claude Gingras (Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute, Toronto, Canada) have been elected as EMBO members, in recognition of their remarkable achievements in the life sciences. The new EMBO Members join a growing list of renowned researchers elected before them, which includes 88 Nobel laureates.

Paola Picotti elected as a member of the German National Academy of Sciences – The Leopoldina

Paola Picotti, ETH Zurich, has been elected as a member of the German National Academy of Sciences. The Leopoldina unites researchers with outstanding expertise in their respective fields, currently counting around 1,600 Academy members from over 30 countries.

ERC Consolidator Grant for consortium member, Paola Picotti

The European Research council (ERC) just awarded the coveted ERC consolidator grant to Paola Picotti from ETH Zurich. The ERC funding awarded for 301 top scientists and scholars across Europe, as part of the Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, is worth in total €600 million. With this support, the new grantees will have a chance to build up their teams and have far-reaching impact. Find out more…

Consortium member, Paola Picotti honoured with EMBO Gold Medal

EMBO awards the  Gold Medal annually to honour the exceptional achievements of selected life scientists under the age of 40 in Europe. It stands for recognition of research excellence and the importance of young independent group leaders in creating a strong research environment. Babu and Picotti will each receive a gold medal and a cash prize of 10,000 euros.  Read more: Babu and Picotti honoured with EMBO Gold Medal.

ERC Advanced Grant for consortium member, Bernhard Küster

The European Research council just awarded an ERC Advanced Grant to Bernhard Küster  and his team at the Chair for Proteomics and Bioanalytics. The proposal titled “Exploiting the Tumor Proteome Activity Status for Future Cancer Therapies” will investigate the protein activity in diseased tissue with the goal to derive at a better understanding of the underlying cancer and suggest targeted therapies for the individual patient with the overall aim to more tightly connect quantitative proteomics and medical science. Find out more… ERC Advanced Grant for Bernhard Küster

ERC consolidator grant to Thomas Arnesen – UiB Norway

Thomas Arnesen is one of five Norwegian researchers who has received a prestigious consolidator grant from the European Research Council in 2017.

The title of the ERC-praised project is fittingly entitled “Discovery and functional significance of posttranslational N-terminal acetylation”. The European Research Council will now support this project with around two million euros for up to five years.

Read more here.

EPIC-XS researchers fighting COVID-19

Open-Access Publications

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to spread, research on SARS-CoV-2 is also rapidly evolving and the number of associated manuscripts on preprint servers is soaring. To facilitate proteomic research, Zecha et al. present protein expression profiles of four model cell lines and investigate the response of Vero E6 cells to viral infection. Further, they evaluate the feasibility of proteomic analysis for SARS-CoV-2 diagnostics and critically discuss the merits of proteomic approaches in the context of the COVID-19 research. Full article is available: https://www.mcponline.org/content/mcprot/early/2020/06/26/mcp.RA120.002164.full.pdf

Grants

EPIC-XS members, Charlotte Stadler and Emma Lundberg, (Scilifelab/KTH) were awarded two separate grants from Scilifelab/KAW as part of a program to fight COVID-19. The Swedish COVID-19 program is funded by Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation with a total of 50 MSEK. In addition, the SciLifeLab board has decided to allocate 12 MSEK of national SciLifeLab funding, for coordinating the program and connecting it to the SciLifeLab infrastructure.

Emma Lundberg’s project, ‘Building a platform with AI models, datasets and web applications for fighting COVID-19, focuses on building a platform for sharing available AI models and datasets related to COVID-19.  Charlotte received funding for her project  “Spatial single-cell mapping of SARS-CoV-2 interacting host proteins for quick and targeted drug repurposing.”

 PUBLICATIONS

The EPIC-XS Access site in Belgium published (March 2020) a simple approach to quantify peptides prior to LC-MS/MS analysis. Using a microfluidic UV/visible spectrophotometer the method allows to quantify MS-ready peptides directly in the MS-loading solvent, consuming only 2 microliter of sample. The article can be accessed via https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsomega.0c00080

Want to find out what else we’ve been up to? All publications can be viewed via the EPIC-XS publication webpage.

European Proteomics Infrastructure Consortium –
Providing Access

The online G.I.T. Laboratory Journal (Wiley Analytical Science, Vol 24 , March 2020, pg 32-35)  reports on how a European proteomics iniatitive, like EPIC-XS, can help further life science research both on a European level and globally.

European Proteomics Infrastructure Consortium – Providing Access (EPIC-XS) research community, representing countries spread across fourteen European member states

EPIC-XS KICKS OFF

The online Technology Networks Journal report on an EPIC Proteomics Kick Off.

EPIC-XS, funded as part of the Horizon 2020 Work programme, held its kick-off meeting in Amsterdam on April 25-26 2019.

Continue reading …..The EPIC-XS Consortium Kicks Off

EPIC-XS consortium members who attended the kick-off meeting in Amsterdam, from left to right: Javier Munoz, Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Oncologicas, Madrid, Spain; Maarten Altelaar, Utrecht University, The Netherlands; Tiziana Bonaldi, Inistituto Europeo di Oncologia, Milan, Italy, and Kris Gevaert, Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie, Ghent.

Proteomics Experts Unite For EPIC-XS

The online Technology Networks Journal interviewed Martina O’Flaherty about EPIC-XS.

Like many disciplines in systems biology, the proteomics research field is evolving at an astonishing rate. Recent advancements in the technologies available for proteomics research has leveraged a large number of research studies directed at exploring the role of proteins in biological processes.

Continue reading ……Proteomics experts unite for EPIC-XS

Utrecht University EPIC-XS consortium members (from left to right ): Richard Scheltema, Maarten Altelaar, Riccardo Zenezini Chiozzi and Franziska Vȯllmy.

EPIC-XS consortium members at the Keystone Symposia, on Molecular and Cellular Biology, Stockholm

A perfect opportunity arose at the Keystone Symposia in Stockholm, for some consortium members to catch up and discuss the

European Proteomics Initiative, EPIC-XS, before the kick off on the 25th of April.

From left to right: Bernhard Küster (Technical University Munich),

Jesper Olsen (University of Copenhagen) and Albert Heck (Utrecht University, EPIC-XS coordinator)

EPIC-XS Press Release

The European Union has awarded 10 million euro to a consortium of eighteen European research groups in the field of mass spectrometry based proteomics research throughout Europe. Read more