“Complex diseases? Blame it on the fibroblasts”, a new meeting within CIVIS “Cups & Cakes” Web Seminars

On Monday, September 27, 2021, CIVIS organizes the webinar “Complex diseases? Blame it on the fibroblasts”. Speaker within the conference is George Kollias, member of the Academy of Athens, professor and director of the Department of Physiology (Medical School, UoA), and Associated Researcher at the Biomedical Sciences Research Center “Alexander Fleming”.

The event, part of the “Cups & Cakes” Web Seminars, will take place between 10:00-11:00 (CET) on Webex.

As this event is only offered to the CIVIS Community, please contact Julie Hyzewicz for more information and to register.

Presentation abstract

Mesenchymal cells (MCs) refer to a variety of cell types, most commonly tissue fibroblasts and mesenchymal stromal cells, which form tissue microenvironments, mediate tissue structure and function and regulate immune responses.

In the past decade, our lab contributed to the understanding of the causal role played by tissue fibroblasts in immunity, inflammation and cancer. Understanding the cellular heterogeneity and the physiological significance of fibroblasts in the pathophysiology of chronic inflammatory disease and cancer remains a great challenge that promises to introduce innovative concepts and therapies for these complex diseases.

CIVIS has been established as a University that reaches from the local level to the international dimension, focused on responding to local needs, contributing to regional development strategies and addressing global challenges. The development of Research and Innovation (R&I), as an integral component of its educational mission, has been part of the CIVIS mission from the very beginning.

It is in this perspective that RIS4CIVIS has been elaborated and now operates. The overall objective is to produce an integrated, long-term R&I Strategy that, will over time enable the constituent members of the CIVIS European University to seamlessly integrate their know-how, expertise and resources in the service of Research and Innovation that effectively addresses current and future societal challenges, at local, regional and international level.

As part of the activities developed to reach this objective, the Cups&Cakes meetings aim to create a discussion forum for researchers to connect and get an overview of what is happening in other partner universities on a specific topic. In the longer term, these exchanges also aim to foster exchanges and develop potential collaborations within the CIVIS Alliance.

These Cups&Cakes will be scheduled for one hour and will consist of two phases:

– A 40-minutes presentation of current research work chosen by the speaker (including a 5-minute introduction of general expertise and work in progress within the university on the topic of interest).

– Open discussion of about 20 minutes.

These meetings will take place on Mondays every two weeks from 10h00 to 11h00. Each partner University, in turns, will have the opportunity to present to the CIVIS Community a subject of their research.

More details about the events organized within CIVIS “Cups & Cakes” Web Seminars and about registration for each of this events are available here.