Strengthening links with Singapore

This week IBEC director Josep Samitier, group leaders Elisabeth Engel, Xavier Trepat and Pere Roca-Cusachs, and Ester Sánchez, representing the Strategic Initiatives Unit, are in Singapore to take part in the first IBEC-MBI Joint Symposium, which took place on 26th September.

The event, hosted by the Mechanobiology Institute (MBI), the National University of Singapore’s dedicated centre focused on exploring this emerging field at the interface of cell biology, physics, engineering and computational biology, aimed to foster collaboration between the two institutions.

The programme included sessions on specific fields of research shared by the two centers, namely cell-matrix interactions, regenerative medicine, matrix to nucleus transduction, collective cell migration, and featured speakers from both sides.

“With this joint symposium we aim to disseminate and increase mutual awareness about current scientific work in general, and in particular the research conducted by leading researchers from both IBEC and MBI,” says IBEC director Josep Samitier. “By creating scientific discussion in this way, we hope to generate new ideas that will lead to high impact innovations for society in the future, and to identify high-impact, frontier research topics that may be submitted as project proposals.”

The IBEC representatives are staying in Singapore until Friday, and during the rest of the week they will make institutional visits to other centres and facilities in the city-state, including Nanyang Technological University, Singapore University of Techology and Design, the Institute of Materials Research and Engineering, the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology, and the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology.

One of IBEC’s strategic objectives over the coming years is to increase and consolidate its global network of collaborations with world-class laboratories to promote exchange of researchers and joint projects. This visit to Singapore is a major step towards this goal given the exceptional research and innovation environment related to bioengineering