EATRIS Spain, in its effort to reinforce its strategic agenda and boost the participation of the Health Research Institutes in international activities, has appointed a Scientific Committee. This group will support the National Director, Dr Joan Comella (VHIR), to make the strategic decisions of EATRIS Spain.
The Scientific Committee is formed by six researchers, belonging to EATRIS institutes, at the forefront of translational medicine:
Dr Estefanía CARRASCO (Biodonostia). She counts with more than 15 years of experience in the field of oncology and currently leads the translational research program on digestive tumours and a research line focused on the genetic regulation of stem cells in digestive tumours. She is author of more than 36 papers (some of the latest published in journals such as Cancer Research and Aging Cell), 3 patents and 5 book chapters.
Dr Julia GARCÍA (IGTP). She is a viro-immunologist interested in host-pathogen interactions in HIV-1 infection and their implications for disease outcome for novel therapeutics. She is currently the Virievac research team group leader at IrsiCaixa AIDS Research Institute (based at IGTP), for which she has been able to find continuous financial support through competitive calls and to consolidate R&D alliances with the pharmaceutical industry. She has contributed to a total of 47 publications (44 of those in the Q1 including multidisciplinary journals like Nature, Nature Medicine, Nature Communications, Journal of Experimental Medicine, PLOS Biology, and PLOS Pathogens) and one patent (PCT/IB2018/001456). She has recently been appointed Scientific Director of the IGTP.
Dr Inmaculada IBÁÑEZ (IdiPAZ). She leads the translational research group on Experimental Therapies and Biomarkers in Cancer and coordinates the molecular diagnosis for the choice of treatment in patients with Glioblastomas at IdiPAZ. She has received funds for developing 18 projects as a Principal Investigator and 3 as a collaborating researcher, resulting in more than 40 publications, 50 presentations to congresses and 6 patents. She is director of 11 doctoral theses, 13 master’s degree and final projects. She has been selected for the past four years as one of the 500 most influential women dedicated to research and clinic in Spain.
Dr Agustín LAHOZ (IIS LA FE). He is interested in understanding the interplay between epigenetics and metabolism of cancer. He leads the Biomarkers and Precision Medicine Research Unit (UBMP) which aims to apply MS-based metabolomics and epigenomics to deepen in the understanding of cancer biology and to search new cancer-related biomarkers (diagnosis, prognosis, response…). He has authored 75 publications and one patent. In the last 10 years, he has participated in more than 20 projects as principal investigator and co-investigator. Funding sources include competitive national and international calls and collaborations with the pharmaceutical industry (Janssen, AstraZeneca, Bristol-Myers…). He is currently the Scientific Director and President of the Innovation Committee at IIS LA FE.
Dr Pablo MIR (IBIS). He is a clinical neurologist specialized in Parkinson’s disease (PD) and other movement disorders. He is the Director of the Movement Disorders Unit at the University Hospital of Virgen del Rocío (Seville) and combines his clinician activities with research in the framework of IBIS. His research interests have been focused on the study of PD and other movement disorders using transcranial magnetic stimulation, as well as the study of their clinical aspects and genetic factors. He has published over 100 papers in international papers and has received national and international funding for developing projects in this field.
Dr Federico ROJO (IIS-FJD). He is head of the Pathological Anatomy Service, leads the Molecular Pathology Lab, he is also the director of the research program on breast cancer and the scientific director of the biobank at the IIS-FJD. He has been involved in more than 20 competitive projects, as PI or collaborator. He is an author in more than 210 publications in the field of cancer biomarkers, 12 book chapters and 483 scientific presentations in congresses.
