Coordinated by Prof. Dr. Petra Ritter - CHARITE - Universitätsmedizin Berlin (DE), project management by tp21.
37 Partners -  TEF-Health project awarded € 60 million for Testing and Experimentation Facility for Health AI and Robotics (EU funding and national fundings)

From the lab to the market

TEF-Health will develop a reference Testing and Experimentation Facility (TEF) with a focus on full integration, testing and validation of advanced AI-based technologies and robotics technologies for health and care.
It aims to accelerate the testing and certifications, to speed up the development and the market access of trustworthy AI solutions in Europe, for both private and public sector use. TEF-Health intends to increase the effectiveness, resilience and sustainability of European health and care systems, and reduce healthcare delivery inequalities in Europe, while ensuring compliance with relevant legal, ethical, quality and interoperability requirements.

more soon on the project website

more on the CORDIS website

Coordinated by Prof. Jan Baumbach, Institute for Computational Systems Biology, Universität Hamburg (DE), project management by tp21.
Duration: 5 years - Start: 01 April 2023 - Total funding: approximately € 6 million.

Vision...

In the EU, 1 in 35 women and 1 in 23 men will be diagnosed with colorectal cancer (CRC) in their life span (ca. 340,000
cases and 156,000 deaths in 2020) causing an annual economic burden of ca. 20 billion EUR. Identifying CRC early
enables better treatment options. Screening usually entails a quantitative faecal immunological test (FIT) to predict the
need of colonoscopy for the detection of colorectal lesions, an expensive and invasive procedure. We aim to predict
this need with specificity increased by >20 percentage points by using metagenomic microbiomes. We hypothesise
that computational microbiome profiles extracted using artificial intelligence (Al) technology will allow for optimised
personal therapy stratification. However, clinicians do not have access to broad microbiome data. With Microb-AIome,
we will develop a novel kind of computational stratification technology to enable microbiome-enhanced precision
medicine of CRC. Metagenomic microbiome data to date is distributed over many national registries, and privacy
regulations are hindering its effective integration. With Microb-AI-ome, we will overcome this barrier by establishing the
first privacy-preserving federated big data network in CRC research. We will integrate isolated, national databases into
one international federated database network - rather than a cloud - covering metagenomes for over 5,000 individuals
screened for CRC, and an expected total of 100,000 by 2026. Microb-AI-ome ensures that no sensitive patient data will
leave the safe harbours of the local databases while still allowing for the classification of clinical CRC phenotypes, which
we will demonstrate in clinical practice allowing regulatory bodies to adopt evidence-based guidelines. Our consortium
combines expertise in CRC and its treatment, microbiomics, artificial intelligence, software development, and privacy
protection to close the gap between privacy and big data in international medical research.

More here

Counterfactual Assessment and Valuation for Awareness Architecture

Coordinated by Prof. Paul Verschure, STICHTING RADBOUD UNIVERSITEIT (NL), project management by tp21.
Duration: 4 years - Start: 01 October 2022 - Total funding: approximately € 3.1 million.

Vision

More here

eBRAIN-Health - Actionable Multilevel Health Data
Coordinated by Prof. Petra Ritter, CHARITE, project management by tp21.
Duration: 4 years, starting 1 July 2022 - Total funding: approximately € 13 million.

Vision

The project aims to develop a decentralized, data protection-compliant research platform capable of simulating some of the brain’s complex neurobiological phenomena. As part of the project, researchers will collate an array of different types of information, including data from PET and MRI scans, EEG tests, behavioral studies and lifestyle surveys, as well as clinical data from thousands of patients and healthy controls. These will be combined with biological information from knowledge databases and made available for research purposes. The resultant digital ‘brain twins’ will enable large numbers of researchers to conduct innovative research within a powerful digital infrastructure.

Thanks to its transparent analytical pipelines, the new research infrastructure will also help to promote reproducible research.

Furthermore, complex, personalized brain simulations which take into account large quantities of data may be able to provide a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying brain function and disorders. Virtual brain modeling may also improve diagnostics and disease prediction, in addition to enabling the optimization of treatment plans. The project consortium comprises 20 partners and operates in cooperation with EBRAINS AISBL, the coordinating entity of the EU-funded flagship ‘Human Brain Project’.

The next World Cancer Congress (WCC) will be held in Geneva, Switzerland from 17 to 20 October 2022,

a combination of on-site events with virtual elements such as webinars, podcasts and online presentations.

How to contribute to the programme?

Whether you are an experienced oncologist, a dedicated cancer researcher, an inspirational caregiver, a committed volunteer representing a patient support group, an employee of a cancer society, a fundraiser or the General Director of a hospital, get involved by contributing to one of the programme features and get ready to stand in the spotlight of the World Cancer Congress.

Sessions - Abstracts - Cinema - Awards - Spotlight Stage --> more here

The topic will be Recruitment in Clinical Trials.
ICTD 2022 will take place 17 May 2022 in Berlin, Langenbeck-Virchow-Haus.

Registration is mandatory.  Details >> here.

New European initiative will build a collaborative platform for data and sample sharing, to accelerate the discovery and validation of biomarkers for neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and Parkinson’s disease (PD).

• EPND will become a future European infrastructure, facilitating access to biological samples and data to accelerate biomarker discovery and validation and eventually support the development of therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases.

For more please visit www.epnd.org

• The European Platform for Neurodegenerative Diseases (EPND) integrates existing initiatives to build, grow, and deliver a scalable and self-sustainable platform for storage and analysis of high-quality clinical samples and data collections.
• EPND is a public-private partnership funded by the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI), a Joint Undertaking between the EU and European pharmaceutical industries that supports projects at the vanguard of health research.

EPND will bring together 29 partners from the public and private sectors and will be managed by two public partners, University of Maastricht and University of Leicester, and two private partners, Gates Ventures and UCB Biopharma. EPND will leverage and connect existing European research infrastructures, including BBMRI, EATRIS, ELIXIR and EBRAINS.

29 Nov - 01 Dec 2021

This event will provide essentials and timely information about global clinical trial disclosure, data transparency, data sharing for secondary research and updates on the EU Clinical Trial Information System (CTIS) and how Brexit is impacting the disclosure ecosystem.

Featured topics:

>>

HORIZON-INFRA-2021-EOSC-01-06
Research and Innovation Action

Expected Outcomes

• researchers, healthcare professionals, cancer patients and survivors contributing to cancer research regularly interact with EOSC to store, share, access, analyse and process research data and other research digital objects from their own discipline, across disciplines and national borders;
  ....more below
  
  
• open and FAIR data are the new norm for research conducted under this mission area;
• EU-wide sharing of research data relevant to this area is shown to be a critical mechanism to facilitate cancer research across Member States and Associated Countries;
• contribute to guaranteeing safety of patients’ data while at the same time contributing to research advancement. Engaging with patients/survivors in the sharing, access and use of data;
• EOSC grows into a trusted research and innovation data space and service platform in Europe that supports the interdisciplinary community involved in this mission area;
• contribute to the Horizon Europe EOSC Partnership and other relevant partnerships related to cancer research.
  
  more here

The new Horizon Europe 2021-2022 work programs are now published.

First calls are open.

All work programs are available on the Funding and Tenders Portal under "Reference Documents".

tp21 supports application set-up and project management.

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The Digital Europe Programme (DIGITAL) is a new EU funding programme focused on bringing digital technology to businesses, citizens and public administrations.
A planned overall budget of € 7.5 billion will support projects in five key capacity areas:

supercomputing | artificial intelligence | cybersecurity | advanced digital skills | ensuring a wide use of digital technologies across the economy, society, including through Digital Innovation Hubs.

How to get funding? More here  

The European Commission mobilises €123 million for research and innovation to combat the threat of variants.

Two calls are published

• Vaccines & therapeutic clinical trials to boost COVID-19 prevention and treatment
• Cohorts united against COVID-19 variants of concern.

tp21 supports application set-up and project management.

Joint transnational call “Addressing adverse and beneficial effects of food ingredients and food processing on hypersensitivities to food.

The aim of this call is to address how food ingredients and food processing methods could favour or prevent the occurrence of food intolerances and allergies in society.

more >> here

The Virtual Brain Cloud project is  partner in the European Open Science Cloud initiative.

Short video explaining the Virtual Brain Cloud - a GDPR compliant health data platform for the personalized prevention and treatment of dementia.

more >> here

Achieving Gender Diversity

European Training Network G-VERSITY joins 8 leading European research groups from psychology, education, management, business administration, media and communication studies.

More here

Call for projects on low-carbon technologies and processes

deadlines in 2020 and 2021

see more << here

Answers on questions such as

• fulfillment of time / delivery date commitments
• documentation of working hours during home office
• project extension
• review meetings
• reimbursement of costs for cancelled event

More >> here

The recent escalation of restrictions related to the COVID-19 outbreak may hamper applicants’ ability to prepare and finalise high-quality proposals.

For this reason, for Horizon 2020 calls with original deadlines between now and 15 April, extensions will be applied. The precise new deadlines for each call and topic will be published on the call and topic pages on the Funding and Tenders Portal.

IMI call now published: Development of therapeutics and diagnostics combatting coronavirus infections

Scope: Considering that this is a newly-identified virus, the scope of this topic remains broad and must address at least one of the following objectives:

• development of antivirals as well as other types of therapeutics to address a rapid response to the current COVID-19 outbreak;
• development of therapeutics to address the current and/or future coronavirus outbreaks;
• development of diagnostics, ensuring rapid evaluation of candidates based on existing technologies;
• development of fast and reliable tools that go beyond the state of the art for detection of COVID-19 carriers and symptomatic individuals suspected of COVID-19 infection.
  
  

Preventive vaccines are specifically excluded from the scope of the Call.

Indicative budget

• From EFPIA companies and IMI2 Associated Partners: to be defined based upon selected proposals
• From the IMI2 JU: EUR 45 000 000
• Submission deadline: 31 March 2020

For full details of the topic, including the budget breakdown and the General Conditions for the Call for proposals, click on the links above (which take you directly to the relevant page of the Participant Portal) or read the IMI2 - Call 21 Text.

>> Do not hesitate to contact tp21 to be the responsible management partner in your IMI proposal.

UK participation in Horizon 2020

The UK and the EU have agreed a flexible extension of the Article 50 period to 31 January 2020. During this period, the UK will remain a member of the EU with all the relevant rights and obligations. This means that UK organisations can continue to participate in Horizon 2020 as a Member State, and remain eligible to apply for Horizon 2020 funding. Read more about deal and no-deal scenarios to ensure continuity of funding here:

UKRO Brexit factsheet>> https://www.ukro.ac.uk/Documents/factsheet_brexit.pdf?pubdate=20191030

GOV.UK >>  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-participation-in-horizon-2020-uk-government-overview/uk-participation-in-horizon-2020-after-brexit

IMI’s next Calls for proposals are currently under discussion and are expected for early 2020.

The list of topics under discussion is given below:

• Neurodegeneration and other neuroscience priorities
• Infection control including vaccines
• Big data, digital health, clinical trials and regulatory research
• Oncology
  
• Facilitating the translation of advanced therapies to patients in Europe

More >> here:   https://www.imi.europa.eu/apply-funding/future-topics

VirtualBrainCloud, coordinated by P. Ritter, CHARITE, a 15 Mio € EU project, started on Januar 1st 2019.

TVB cloud on Twitter

→ About VirtualBrainCloud

The annual worldwide cost of Alzheimer’s dementia was 777.81 billion Euro in 2015. This number will rise to 7.41 trillion Euro in 2050. Early diagnosis would save up to $7.9 trillion in medical and care costs by 2050 in the US alone. However, the emergent pathology is highly variable across people, necehighly variable across people, necessitating individualized diagnostics and interventions. The VirtualBrainCloud addresses this by bridging the gap between computational neuroscience and subcellular systems biology, integrating both research streams into a unifying computational model that supports personalized diagnostics and treatments in NDD. TheVirtualBrainCloud not only integrates existing software tools, it also merges the efforts of two big EU initiatives, namely The Virtual Brain large scale simulation platform of the EU Flagship Human Brain Project and IMI-EPAD initiative (European prevention of Alzheimer’s dementia consortium). VirtualBrainCloud will develop and validate a decision support system that provides access to high quality multi-disciplinary data for clinical practice. The result will be a cloud-based brain simulation platform to support personalized diagnostics and treatments in NDD. The EU PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe) initiative, will provide the required computing infrastructure. The VirtualBrainCloud will develop robust solutions for legal and ethical matters by interacting with EU projects such as European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), ‘cloud4health’, Alzheimer’s Europe patient organizations and ELIXIR, an organization that manages and safeguards EU research data. Our software developers have already produced highly successful brain simulation and clinical decision support tools. The resulting software will be a cloud based computational modeling system that is tailored to the individual, and bridges multiple scales to identify key mechanisms that predict NDD progression and serves as Precision Decision Support System.

The European Commission has published its proposal for Horizon Europe, an ambitious €100 billion research and innovation programme that will succeed Horizon 2020.

For the next long-term EU budget 2021-2027, the Commission is proposing €100 billion for research and innovation.