| ISS2008: "Advanced Biomedical Technologies for Treatment of Osteochondral Defects" |
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International Summer School on Treatment of Osteochondral Defects took place at the Marine Biology Station Piran from 14th to 21st September. The Summer School was organized as a PhD level course intended for graduate students in life sciences and engineering. The course was organized by the Blood Transfusion Centre of Slovenia, Faculty of Technology and Metallurgy, University of Belgrade, National Institute of Biology and Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS). The topics of the lectures included everything from physiology of cartilage and bone and clinical problems to engineering approaches to regeneration of injured tissue. Legislation and slow knowledge translation from the laboratory to clinics were also discussed.     Seventeen experts and scientists with a good reputation from different fields of work gathered in Piran to give lectures on treatment of oseteochondral defects. The summer school was intended mainly for PhD students from different life sciences and engineering studies. Despite that students, who participated in the summer school, came from very different backgrounds, with different experience and knowledge and of various age. Among the participants were students of medicine, stomatology, biotechnology, pharmacy and a lot of undergraduate students of diverse natural sciences. The majority of the students came from Slovenia and Serbia, among those present were also participants from Spain, Israel, Iran, Portugal and Switzerland. The aim was to introduce the students to the latest clinical applications and accompanying technologies for treatment of osteochondral defects. The lectures acquainted the students with different aspects of developing new strategies for clinical applications, starting with the clinical problem and laboratory scale systems, and ending with engineering, ethical and legislative issues for tissue engineering products that must be fulfilled for a product to reach the market. There was also some discussion about economy, market potential and business and about the problem of slow translation of research into clinics. The course combined lectures and practical laboratory demonstrations. The school began with physiology of cartilage and bone, and the clinical problem of injury of these tissues. Matej Drobnič, MD PhD described very clearly and with a lot of experience from clinics the actual clinical problems of cartilage and bone defects. During the following days many experts (Nevenka Kregar Velikonja, PhD, Hana Krečič Stres, PhD, Darja Marolt, PhD, Gordana Vunjak Novaković, PhD) discussed the tissue engineering approaches for regeneration of injured tissues, with focus on the design and selection of appropriate biomaterials used in bone and cartilage tissue engineering (Bianca Barolli, PhD, Smadar Cohen, PhD) and the design and operation of bioreactor systems (Bojana Obradović, PhD). The characterization of laboratory made cartilage and bone tissue is very important to estimate its functional and mechanical properties as was very nicely presented by Dieter Wirz. PhD. Summer School concluded with lectures about ethical dilemmas and legislation on the field of advanced therapies (Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Ralf R. Tönjes). In the building of Marine Biology Station Piran is also a small hostel with some beautiful rooms and two well equipped kitchens. During the course most of participants lived at the Marine Station but because of the lack of space some also stayed in hostel Val in the centre of Piran. The majority of the day was occupied with lectures and lab demonstrations. In the evenings, students gathered in study groups (five students from different countries) and discussed topics that were mentioned earlier that day. Group work proved to be an excellent way of learning and a very good help to understand various topics because all participants passed the exam at the end of course with the average grade higher than 80%. The summer school was worth 4 ECTS credits and the students obtained a certificate for the PhD level course from the Faculty of Technology and Metallurgy, University of Belgrade, Serbia. Webpage: www.abttod.org and group on Facebook - International Summer School - Piran 2008. At the end, the participants and the organizers were very satisfied with the successful summer school, and everyone is hoping to repeat the project next year. In every way, the Summer school in Piran was a true success.                            |