News

On March 16th, 2015, the 4th SMART Lecture was delivered by Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, Chairman of the Board of Nestlé S.A. The topic “Big Data Challenges and Opportunities for Food and Nutritional Sciences” attracted an audience of some 150 people, among them scientists, students and interested visitors. CeMM’s PhD Students obtained the chance to meet the Austrian businessman with an exceptional career in an industry branch confronted with major…

Dissecting the human epigenome one cell at a time Every human life starts from a single cell. This cell, the zygote, undergoes many rounds of cell division and epigenome remodeling as it gives rise to the different cell types in the human body. Each organ of our body comprises a handful of cell types that serve specific biological functions. But there is often significant variation between single cells of the same type. Such cell-to-cell…

Giulio Superti-Furga takes over the professorship for Medical Systems Biology at the Medical University of Vienna. The Scientific Director of CeMM Research Center for Molecular Medicine of the Austrian Academy of Sciences was previously a Visiting Professor of Molecular Pharmacology at the Medical University of Vienna. At the same time Sylvia Knapp, Professor of Infection Biology at the Medical University of Vienna and Principal Investigator at…

Breast cancer is clinically subdivided into receptor positive or negative tumors, (also known as triple negative breast cancer). Receptor positivity indicates a better prognosis as several specific agents to treat these tumors are available. Such agents, however, have been lacking for receptor negative tumors. To try to identify new agents that would specifically kill triple negative breast cancer cells, a team led by CeMM Principal Investigator…

EU-LIFE European research centres obtained 14 new ERC Starting and Consolidator grants in the latest competitions, which takes the total of ERC-funded grants currently running in centres belonging to the alliance to over 100. As a whole, EU-LIFE partners have a success rate of at least three times higher than the general success rate of ERC Starting and Consolidator grants (over 33% compared to an average of 10%). But this news comes with a…

The 2015 CeMM PhD Program is now open for applications. For our next program starting in October 2015 we are looking for exceptionally motivated PhD candidates with a keen interest in genomics and medicine and an ability and desire to work in a team. The 2015 CeMM PhD program will focus on two thematic areas: infection and cancer. These thematic areas are built on the pillars of epigenetics, bioinformatics and systems biology, chemical biology…

The 2015 CeMM PhD Program is now open for applications. For our next program starting in October 2015 we are looking for exceptionally motivated PhD candidates with a keen interest in genomics and medicine and an ability and desire to work in a team. The 2015 CeMM PhD program will focus on two thematic areas: infection and cancer. These thematic areas are built on the pillars of epigenetics, bioinformatics and systems biology, chemical biology…

Today it was announced that the UK life science company Horizon Discovery Group plc acquired Haplogen Genomics GmbH, a wholly subsidiary of Haplogen GmbH, the first CeMM spinout company. Haplogen’s scientific roots lie in the haploid genetics technology developed by CeMM Adjunct Principal investigator Thijn Brummelkamp while he was a fellow at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research of the M.I.T. This technology greatly enhances the…

In order to decide whether to grow and proliferate or to break down and recycle, cells need to sense if the required nutrients are available. A central role in this context is played by the mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway that integrates the presence of growth factors, energy levels, glucose and amino acids to modulate cellular responses, such as protein and lipid synthesis. Past studies have demonstrated that the presence of amino…

In a press conference on November 25th, 'Genom Austria' was announced as a joint Citizen Science Project of CeMM, the Medical University of Vienna, and the PersonalGenomes.org foundation. Genom Austria will explore the scientific, educational, philosophical, ethical, and social implications of personal genome sequencing. Following the model of Harvard’s Personal Genome Project, Genom Austria provides qualifying volunteers the opportunity to…

Viruses can predispose the host to bacterial superinfection, and secondary pneumonia is considered to play a major role in the morbidity of seasonal as well as pandemic influenza. Despite the significant clinical and socioeconomic impact, the molecular mechanisms of how influenza virus causes superinfection have been poorly understood. Scientists from Andreas Bergthaler´s Group at CeMM now succeeded in finding a new molecular mechanism, which may…

As a follow-up to the publications on the initial draft of the human proteome that appeared in Nature in May this year, Bernhard Küster and Akhilesh Pandey were invited to CeMM to present their key research findings. As part of their presentations, the speakers described the broad range of applications of their research, such as the use of protein identification to aid forensic teams at crime scenes, or a large-scale malarial study in India. They…

The team of Kaan Boztug, Principal Investigator at CeMM and Assistant Professor at the Department of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine of the Medical University of Vienna discovered the molecular origin of a new rare disease and succeeded in deciphering the essential role of the NFkB-inducing kinase (NIK) for an efficient immune response in humans. The findings have been published online, on November 19th, 2014, in the open access journal Nature…

It is with great sadness that we learn of the decease of Prof. Dr. h.c. mult. Max L. Birnstiel, of Wollerau, Switzerland. Max Birnstiel was the founding director of the Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP) in Vienna and can be held responsible for kicking off the renaissance of the life sciences in Austria in the last 25 years. As a mentor of the CeMM director Giulio Superti-Furga, who in the late eighties had followed him as a PhD student…

It is our great pleasure to congratulate the Medical University of Vienna on their 10 year anniversary! The Medical University of Vienna is one of our key research partners and plays a major role in the education and scientific development of CeMM’s PhD students, and postdoctoral fellows. We truly value the strong collaborative relationship with our neighbours, and we would like to thank the rectorate, our collaborators and the administrative…