ImmUniverse progress meeting in Milan, Italy
On 15th and 16th of May 2023, the ImmUniverse Consortium came together in Milan, Italy, to reflect on the last twelve months and to align on next steps. While the majority of time was allocated to present and discuss the progress of the different work packages, the team was also delighted to welcome our Scientific Advisor Werner Müller, Emeritus Professor of the Division of Immunology, Immunity to Infection and Respiratory Medicine, who held a guest talk on “"Multispacial Biology with help of the MACSima platform".
Further focus points of the meeting included:
- Patient Engagement: Due to the pandemic, the Consortium had missed opportunities for meaningful patient engagement at the beginning of the project. With emerging results it is now time to re-focus on this important aspect. Discussions took place on how patient engagement can be implemented in the coming months and we look forward to intensify the contact with the Patient Input Platforms, facilitated by EFA and EFCCA, and to work in a co-creative manner, e.g., on lay summaries and clips, to highlight the liquid biopsy methodologies that are being established in ImmUniverse for atopic dermatitis and ulcerative colitis.
- Spotlight on Early Career Researchers: Laurien Waaijer from Radboudumc summarised her work on the “44-colour spectral flow cytometry panel suited for a broad range of sample sources” that can be used to do deep immunoprofiling in health and disease, while Andrew Li Yim from AMC provided insights into the utility of single-cell RNA-sequencing in characterising differences in inflammation in ulcerative colitis and response to vedolizumab in CD.
The meeting showed that the project is now underway to achieve its goals, although we still face a delay due the COVID19-pandemic. Importantly, however, recruitment is progressing well and first results start to emerge that will be published in the coming months.
The ImmUniverse consortium at the annual meeting in Milan