EVIMalaR Newsletter - October 2011
Welcome to the first edition of the EVIMalaR Newsletter....
Following a Glasgow ‘summer,’ the EVIMalaR office are back from enjoying the Scottish sun and we are ready for a new exciting and successful year as the project moves into its 3rd year. As always, September is busy with our reporting period. A time to review the many achievements made by our partners throughout the consortium over the previous academic year. We thank you all for your assistance with this process.
We would like to offer our congratulations to Jules Hoffmann who has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. We would also like to extend a warm welcome to the new members of the network; Karen Harron, our financial administrator, our new Affiliates and our three new Fellows.
Welcome to our new affiliates
In April 2011, our second and final call for Affiliates was announced, welcoming applications from European scientific teams interested in con-ducting collaborative re-search with the EVIMalaR consortium. Our second call for Affiliates closed on June 17th, whereby we received 29 applications. Following an evaluation and review period by the Executive Committee, 8 new members were selected to join the network based. Careful considerations were given to integration with the consortium clusters and regional diversity, in addition to the scientific merit of the application. Based upon ESAB recommendations to strengthen collaborations within Modelling and Systems Biology, four members were selected to join Cluster 4.
We are looking forward to the expertise and experience that our new affiliates will bring to their individual clusters, and the network as a whole.
Cluster 1:
James Brewer, University of Glasgow
Carlos Penha Goncalves, Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciencia
Cluster 2:
Alfred Cortes, Institute for Research in Bio-medicine (IRB) Barcelona
Cluster 3:
Ken Vernick, Institut Pasteur
Cluster 4:
Sarah Butcher, Imperial College London
Sarah Reece, University of Edinburgh
Mario Recker, University of Oxford
Julian Rayner, Wellcome Trust Sanger Insti-tute
Jules Hoffman
2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2011 is divided, with one half jointly to Bruce A. Beutler and Jules A. Hoffmann, an affiliate of EVIMa-laR, for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity and the other half to Ralph M. Steinman for his discovery of the dendritic cell and its role in adaptive immunity. This year's Nobel Laureates have revolutionised our understanding of the immune system by dis-covering key principles for its activation.
Scientists have long been searching for the gatekeepers of the immune response by which man and other animals defend themselves against attack by bacteria and other microorganisms. Bruce Beutler and Jules Hoffmann discovered receptor proteins that can recognise such micro-organisms and activate innate immunity, the first step in the body's immune response. Ralph Steinman discovered the dendritic cells of the immune system and their unique capacity to activate and regulate adaptive immunity, the later stage of the immune response during which microorganisms are cleared from the body.
The discoveries of the three Nobel Laureates have revealed how the innate and adaptive phases of the immune response are activated and thereby provided novel insights into disease mechanisms. Their work has opened up new avenues for the development of prevention and therapy against infections, cancer and inflammatory diseases. (Text from Karolinska Instituet: http://ki.se)
OzMalNet Exchange Programme
Whilst Malaria remains a prevalent global problem, collaboration within the re-search community is fundamental to future developments. The OzMalNet pro-gramme is a framework 7 opportunity for malaria re-searchers to undertake re-search, and to work and train in Australian labs. The programme is aimed at providing funding for PhD and early career post doctoral fellows from Europe, Africa & India as part of their cur-rent project, for a period of up to 3 months. With fund-ing support from the European Commission, the EVIMalaR/OzEMalaR exchange links the 54 members of EVIMalaR with 34 top Australian labs, members of the Australian Society for Parasitology. To date, EVIMalaR has funded 7 exchanges to Australia
Why apply...
The OzMalNet programme is essential in facilitating and promoting interaction be-tween colleagues, peers and potential research partners for future development and research in this field. In addition, it aims to communicate the scientific achievements of OzMalNet participants and create further professional development opportunities. Funding covers any of the following projects:
- Exchanges to OzEMalaR laboratories and associated field sites for up to 3 months.
- malaria-related training courses
- to organise and host train-ing workshops in Australia
- Grant writing retreats that promote collaborations between EVIMalaR and OzeMalaR participants
How to apply...
Applicants must be malaria researchers whose laboratory head is a Principal Investigator, either as a full or affiliate member of EVIMa-laR.
Applicants must describe the purpose of the travel, together with a justification of the benefits to the individual and to EVIMalaR as a result of the exchange.
There are 3 calls for application in any 12 month period. The next call for OzMalNet will open on 30th September, 2011.
For further information on how to apply and a Funding Assistance application form, please contact Hansa Pertab in the EVIMalaR Office, ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) or visit www.evimalar.org.
EVIMalaR Fellowship Call, 2011
In May, adverts were placed for EVIMalaR’s second call for fellowship awards and research grants from Postdoctoral Scientists. In this round we had three fellowships to award, with the award commencing in October 2011 and running for three years until the end of the project. Following a successful campaign, we received 22 fellowship applications and 2 research resource applications.
The main criteria of the award was excellence and following a evaluation process by an external review panel, the following three candidate were awarded:
Paco Pino - (Labs: Dominique Soldati-Favre, Geneva & Oliver Billker, Sanger)
Liliana Mancio Silva - (Labs: Maria Mota, IMM & Andy Waters, Glasgow & Oliver Billker, Sanger)
Carolina Agop Nersesian - (Labs: Volker Heussler, Bernhardt Nocht & Freddy Frischknecht, Heidelberg)
New EVIMalaR Website - coming soon!!
We are pleased to announce that EVIMalaR will be launch-ing it’s new website at the end of October. Web designers ‘Alienation Digital’ were selected to design and build a more ‘user-friendly’ site, that is interesting and easy to use with an emphasis on functionality.
Further good news is that not only will it contain the most up to date EVIMalaR Information, it will be a facility to advertise Post Doctoral positions, PhD opportunities, and all relevant job vacancies. It will have up to date meeting information, accept registration forms and payment, and most importantly it has a ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ section for all your EVIMalaR queries.
We anticipate that the new website will assist with all those dreaded chores, including reporting!
If you have any suggestions or information which you would like displayed on the website, please send it through. This could be anything from jobs and funding opportunities to information and updates from
your lab.
In addition, we have plans to launch a secondary site, which can be accessed from and based upon the format of the main EVIMalaR web-site. Drawing upon the intelligent comic which is due for release in November, this website is aimed at school leavers and young researchers, this site will to assist in achieving our EC requirement to establish an ‘outreach’ programme.
Further information on our web designers: www.alienationdigital.co.uk
Introducing Karen Harron...
I am delighted to have joined the EVIMalaR team at Glasgow and excited about bring-ing my reporting and financial experience to the project. I hope my contribution to the project will complement the fantastic resources already in place. I have been working in a project support capacity for 11 years across a number of industries, including the IT, Telecoms and Financial Service sectors. The EVIMalaR project is my first taste of the academic world.
My role within the EVIMalaR project will be to co-ordinate the reporting and financial activities. As you are aware, we are governed by the EC to provide periodic reporting throughout the life of the project, for both the research and finance elements. I hope to simplify the reporting process in the coming years, and to provide a helpful and supportive service to you all, leaving you more time to concentrate on your research activities. Your continued support and contribution is appreciated, and is key to ensuring we meet our deadlines and that we comply with the EC’s extremely high standards.
I hope to get to know you all well in coming months and if you require to con-tact me, you can email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or call me on 00-44-141-330-7351.
The EVIMalaR Intelligent Comic...
Some of you may have met our comic designers, Eddie Ross and Jamie Hall of Chiaroscuro Community Media Productions at the BioMalPar meeting in Heidelberg in May 2011 as they were scouting about for PI and Affiliate pro-files and to understand the workings and dynamics of the
They are now in the final-phases of producing the EVIMalaR intelligent comic.
The final script is being drafted and discussed with Andy and Gill, and the comic images are a work in progress.
We hope to launch the comic our forthcoming cluster meetings in late Autumn/early Winter 2011.
EVIMalaR PhD School, Heidelberg
The general objectives of the PhD school are to educate the next generation of malaria re-searchers and create new collaborative links between participating laboratories in order to build a competitive research structure and to become a global player in malaria research.
After 3-5 months of advertising, we start a selection process divided into two steps in order to secure the best possible candidates. During the first step applicants are sorted based upon formal criteria by suited personnel, later a selection committee, made up of different EVIMalaR members, looks through the applications and selects the most suited candidates for interviews, usually three times the number of fellowships. At the same time interested project leaders can submit project proposals.
Applicants and PIs are then invited to personal interviews including an assessment test, one-to-one interviews for specific projects, a presentation and question-answer during a panel interview.
The awarded students attend a two weeks core course that aims to give them an overview into methods and soft skills for their PhD and to tighten the bonds between students. During the 3.5 years of their PhD the students work within the EVIMalaR network and are overseen by two project leaders from different countries. They meet in regular intervals for courses and conferences.
EVIMalaR PhD students 2011...
We have completed the second call for EVIMalaR PhD students.
From 201 applications, 22 candidates were interviewed at EMBL, Heidelberg in May. Candidates were chosen by the Selection Committee and the decisions were based upon letter of motivation, letters of recommendation and experience in the field of infectious diseases.
We are pleased to announce that 12 students were offered a position with the EVIMalaR PhD Programme which will commence with the core course in Heidelberg from 10th-21st October 2011.
The following applicants were successful:
Ahmed Salman (Egypt)
Adrian Hill; Chris Janse
Gabriella Sferra (Italy)
Marta Ponzi; Bob Sinden
George Rugarabamu (Tanzania)
Dominique Soldati-Favre; Chetan E. Chitnis; Dr. Michael Blackman
Harshal Patil (India)
Andy Waters; Freddy Frischknecht
Jaishree Tripathi (India)
Maria Mota; Oliver Billker
Jenny Howar (UK)
Charlotte Behr; Marita Troye-Blomberg
Kartik Bane (India)
Freddy Frischknecht; Dominique Soldati-Favre
Mariana De Niz Hidalgo (Mexico)
Hernando del Portillo; Volker Heussler
Pablo Suárez Cortés (Spain)
Pietro Alano; David Baker
Samuel Abah (Nigeria)
Delmiro Fernandez-Reyes; Mats Wahlgren
Sonal Sethia (India)
Sylke Mu?ller; Henri Vial
Sonia Moliner Cubel (Spain)
Michael Lanzer; Henri Vial
EVIMalaR Newsletter - October 2011
