- Draft topics for IMI2 – Calls 18 & 19 published
- Sign up for the IMI Stakeholder Forum 2019
- European Commission launches impact award for EU-funded projects
Draft topics for IMI2 – Calls 18 & 19 published
IMI’s next Call for proposals is scheduled for launch at the end of June, and the draft topics are now available on the Future Topics web page. The current list of topics is:
- Central repository of digital pathology slides to support the development of artificial intelligence tools
- Health Outcomes Observatories – empower patients with tools to measure their outcomes in a standardised manner creating transparency of health outcomes
- Improving patient access, understanding and adherence to healthcare information: an integrated digital health information project
- Establishing international standards in the analysis of patient reported outcomes and health-related quality of life data in cancer clinical trials
- Accelerating research & development for advanced therapy medicinal products
- Supporting the development of chimeric antigen receptor T cells
- Restricted call to maximise impact of IMI2 JU objectives and scientific priorities
IMI will organise webinars on all Call topics as well as our rules and procedures and opportunities for SMEs around the time of the Call launch – these will be advertised via future newsletters as well as via Twitter and LinkedIn.
All information regarding future IMI Call topics is indicative and subject to change. Final information about future IMI Calls will be communicated after approval by the IMI Governing Board.
Sign up for the IMI Stakeholder Forum 2019
Registration is open for the IMI Stakeholder Forum 2019, which will take place on Wednesday 12 June in Brussels, Belgium. The theme this year is ‘Brain health and disease in the digital era - 2020 & beyond’. We will explore ways of building IMI Call topics that converge around this relatively new space and which could open up new channels where fresh voices and minds will join established players in the field to solve one of the biggest healthcare challenges of this century. For this event, IMI will bring together European academics, representatives of multiple industry sectors (pharmaceuticals, diagnostics, digital, imaging), patient groups, clinicians, regulators, legal experts, ethicists and health economists to discuss how we could develop game-changing initiatives in this area.
The agenda is available on the event web page.
Participation in the Stakeholder Forum is free of charge but registration is obligatory. To register, simply fill in this form. Registration will close on Friday 17 May.
European Commission launches impact award for EU-funded projects
The European Commission has launched the first Horizon Impact Award, dedicated to EU-funded projects whose results have made a difference to society across Europe and beyond. The competition is open to all projects funded under Horizon 2020 or the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) that have closed and can demonstrate their impact.
‘Great science is what moves our world forward, and more than ever we look to the world of research for solutions to the challenges we are facing,' said Carlos Moedas, European Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation. ‘With this award we want to celebrate the scientists whose work has made a difference to all of us in our daily lives.’
The competition was set up to illustrate the wider socio-economic benefits of EU investments in research and innovation, and to encourage project beneficiaries to reflect on how best to manage and utilise research results. As such, the prize will highlight concrete achievements that have demonstrable value for society, and will celebrate the people who made it happen. A panel of high-level experts will select 5 winners, who will each receive EUR 10 000 at a ceremony at an event in September.
Deadline for applications: 28 May
IMPRiND scientists work out structure of tau filaments in dementia associated with head injuries
Scientists have unravelled the structure of the abnormal tau filaments associated with chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a type of dementia associated with repeated blows to the head. Furthermore, the tau filaments associated with CTE are different to those found in people with Alzheimer’s disease. The work, which was published in the prestigious journal Nature, was funded in part by IMI through the IMPRiND project. The findings add to our understandings of how different forms of dementia develop, and could pave the way for future treatments for CTE and other diseases associated with abnormal tau filaments. CTE is associated with repeated blows to the head, as experienced by people who regularly play contact sports such as boxing, rugby and football. Symptoms include behavioural changes, confusion and memory loss. There is no treatment and a definitive diagnosis can only be made via an autopsy. In this latest study, the scientists studied tau filaments taken from the brains of three people with CTE: a retired professional American football player, who had died aged 67, and two former professional boxers, who had died aged 67 and 78, respectively. The structure of the tau filaments in all three CTE patients was identical, but different from the structure of tau filaments taken from Alzheimer’s patients. Most notably, the CTE patients’ tau filaments appeared to have ‘cavities’ which were filled with other molecules. ‘The fact that the structures of the tau filaments were identical in the American football player and both boxers suggests that we’ve found a new criterion for post-mortem diagnosis of the disease,’ said Michel Goedert, who led the study with Sjors Scheres at the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK. ‘Our new knowledge of these structures could make it possible to diagnose CTE in living patients by developing tracer compounds that will specifically bind to the tau filaments of CTE.’
EHDEN looking for SMEs to take on health data challenge
IMI’s EHDEN project is looking for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to get involved in the project’s efforts to map and convert health data from diverse sources to a common model. The project has launched a pilot call for SMEs who want to get training and certification in this exciting new field. EHDEN’s ambitious goal is to standardise 100 million patient records across Europe covering different data source types, including hospitals, registries, and population databases. Transforming this data to the Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP) common data model (CDM) is an immense task that EHDEN hopes will be carried out by a community of SMEs. SMEs selected through this pilot call will receive training in this and a certification that will highlight their expertise in this area. ‘We expect that those who receive training and certification through EHDEN will actually go on to perform mappings to help build the network,’ the project writes. ‘We also hope that they will become active members of the community, sharing ideas and possibly helping to develop or improve data mappings and analysis tools.’ According to the project, SMEs will also benefit from access to a larger market, the opportunity to build expertise in and contribute to a relatively new field, and the support of the wider EHDEN community. Finally, certified SMEs will receive invitations to additional training sessions as well as hackathons to improve the open source tools and other events.
- Details of how to apply can be found on the EHDEN website.
- Deadline for applications: 1 May 2019
First blood cancer data transferred to HARMONY big data platform
Partners in blood cancer alliance HARMONY have uploaded the first datasets into the HARMONY Big Data Platform. This is a major milestone for the large alliance that aims to improve the treatment of haematologic malignancies. This first batch of data focuses on acute myeloid leukaemia (AML), a form of blood cancer that is most common in the over 75s. There are effective treatments for AML, but many elderly and weaker patients are not strong enough to tolerate the intensive chemotherapy regimens. Improved insight into the molecular basis of the disease is essential to develop better treatments for these patients. This requires data from thousands of patients. Therefore, HARMONY is bringing together datasets from all over Europe. The datasets that were recently uploaded into the Big Data Platform are from the German Austrian AML Study Group (AMLSG); the Haemato Oncology Foundation for Adults in the Netherlands (HOVON); and Novartis’s RATIFY trial. More HARMONY Partners are ready to transfer their data to the platform as well. ‘With such positive efforts in sharing aggregated data of hundreds of patients, the hope is that other data custodians across industry and academia will also be inspired to join the HARMONY Alliance’, said HARMONY project lead Mirko Vukcevic from Novartis. ‘In the future, the aspiration is that the HARMONY Alliance model will allow us to create a blueprint that can be applied to future projects in other disease areas, ultimately benefiting many more patients in Europe and well beyond.’ HARMONY is a unique network of more than 80 public-private organizations. It is part of IMI’s Big Data for Better Outcomes programme.