ESTOOLS - Advances with human embryonic stem cells -

estools logo

Wednesday 26 - Friday 28 May

INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC SYMPOSIUM

"stem cells in biology and disease" 

 

ESTOOLS from its conception has been very geographically spread – a project of 21 partners in 10 countries. It is our intent that this science is developed and embraced by all Europe. Our logo states that our mission is to advance knowledge of embryonic stem cells, and so we have worked to grow and network this science base in Europe.

ESTOOLS has many partners in northern Europe, from Great Britain across northern and central continental Europe and Scandinavia to Finland. As the European Union expanded in 2004 to include new members in the east of Europe, our consortium’s networking has developed under a Director from the Czech Republic. Our first annual meetings and public symposia were in Brno and in Budapest – the frontiers of embryonic stem cell knowledge advanced to the east. Along this eastward trail our itinerant photo-exhibition Smile of a Stem Cell increasingly was exposed to the public, putting its toes into the Black Sea as far as east as Varna in 2008, and a Stem Cell Symposium was organised in November 2009 for the Sofia public and scientists.

ESTOOLS has worked to explore and construct enduring east-west and south-north relations, to communicate and exchange the purposes and values of the science which unfolds the secrets of the stem cells. Through its T.E.L.E.S.C.O.P.E. programme, we bring high school students to the lab in their city for a day of learning, and link the student group in one city with another far across Europe. By 2010 Smile of a Stem Cell has visited over 16 cities across 12 countries, and T.E.L.E.S.C.O.P.E. has linked 5 pairs of schools in 10 cities in 10 nations.

Each European country has its own cultures and laws, these influence the perceptions and regulation of the science. ESTOOLS is compelled by its European Commission contract to operate in the laboratory totally within the rules of each local system. But knowledge transcends state frontiers, and perceptions develop. In 2009 ESTOOLS worked from the extreme European north with a winterschool in Finnish Lapland, to the south where the focus of the 3rd ESTOOLS annual meeting was central Rome on 27 May was “Dissolving the boundaries of stem cell knowledge”. At the winterschool, 45 students from 17 countries were taught by a faculty of 24 from 11 countries - see the report.

In parallel with deepening of knowledge, ESTOOLS is developing tools, techniques and expertise necessary for eventual medical, pharmaceutical and bioindustrial applications of human embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells. In May 2010, the ESTOOLS collaboration will showcase its 4 years of discoveries, and share them with leading scientists from across the world, at a major international symposium in Lisbon - Europe’s historic gateway and expeditionary launch-port for discovery and links with rest of the world. ESTOOLS activity in Lisbon is assisted by the Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian and staff at the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciencia and Instituto de Medicina Molecular. On 29 May 2010 ESTOOLS and Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciencia are collaborating to offer an outreach event for Portuguese schools; from here will come scientists for the future Europe.