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Systems biology of mammalian cells: A report from the Freiburg conference
Author(s) -
Timmer Jens,
Henney Adriano,
Moore Andrew,
Klingmuller Ursula
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
bioessays
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.175
H-Index - 184
eISSN - 1521-1878
pISSN - 0265-9247
DOI - 10.1002/bies.201000109
Subject(s) - library science , german , citation , philosophy , computer science , linguistics
The third international conference on ‘Systems Biology of Mammalian Cells’ (SBMC 2010) was held in Freiburg, Germany, on 3–5 June 2010. The conference, which took place under the auspices of Annette Schavan, the German Federal Minister for Education and Research, was attended by 330 scientists from 18 countries (Fig. 1); there were 36 speakers and 175 posters were presented and actively discussed. The conference was organised by HepatoSys, the German Competence Network for Systems Biology of hepatocytes and its successor the German Virtual Liver Network. In 2004, HepatoSys was launched by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) to investigate intracellular processes in hepatocytes. Since April 2010, the German Virtual Liver Network has been striving to understand these processes at the next level. Building on the results of HepatoSys, the German Virtual Liver Network has started to examine processes in cell assemblies up to the whole organ. In his opening speech the parliamentary state secretary of the BMBF, Helge Braun, emphasised the importance of Systems Biology for the future of medical research. To support this innovative field the BMBF has up to now invested s300 million for past, present and future Systems Biology projects. The chair of the organising committee, Jens Timmer, University of Freiburg, welcomed the international participants with an overview of the history of the meeting venue. Afterwards, Adriano Henney, Program Director of the German Virtual Liver Network, introduced the ambitious goals of the network. The project started in April 2010 and is financed by the BMBF with s42 million for 5 years.