IBEC’s participation at B·Debate

Xavier Rubies, head of IBEC’s technology transfer unit, took part in the From Bench to Bedside roundtable, where he explained how to go from research to market. The speakers at the round table agreed that in order to achieve an effective result research transfer to the industry, it is necessary to start from the demand and lead the projects to the market, according to Xavier Rubies.

These conferences aim to suggest ideas and explore the potential of new therapeutic approaches for retinal dystrophies, combining nanotechnology, regenerative medicine, stem cells, gene therapy, genomics, bioengineering and the optogentics photonics.

Blindness is a major global health challenge due to the enormous impact it has on patients and their families, as well as its important socio-economic consequences. Besides the great emotional impact that it implies for patients and their families, it also means the inability to pursue education, to find a quality job, more risk because of falls and accidents, a limited autonomy and an obstacle to have an active and quality lifestyle.

During the coming years, one of every four people over 50 will suffer some kind of degenerative eye disease. Currently in the EU there are 91 million people over 65 years and it is expected to reach 127 million by 2020. It is estimated that there are 285 million people worldwide with impaired vision and 39 million of them are blind.

Basic and translational researchers, leaders and experts in all these fields have attended these conferences in order to share innovative therapeutic opportunities in each sector, and especially in the exploration and discovery of possible synergies to generate new multidisciplinary collaborative research projects in this field.