Introduction - Summer 2023
Paul Ross, Director, APC Microbiome Ireland
Hi everyone,
Greetings from all of us at APC Microbiome Ireland for the summer that is in it – and just wanted to give you a brief update on some of the highlights from the Centre over the last few months.
Our co-funded INSPIRE programme with the EU will see 20 new international post-doctoral researchers join the centre over the next two years. The programme will proceed as two tranches of 10 researchers and was officially started in June with the first injection of scientists.
We also held a very successful conference in June around computational biology which saw many international microbiome scientists discussing and critiquing bioinformatic methods which is covered in “Where Mathematics Meets the Microbiome” in this newsletter.
APC also took part in the annual EU consortium meeting of the International Human Microbiome Consortium (IHMC) in June of this year which brings together many of the expert groups in Europe to discuss everything from microbiome methodology to defining a human microbiome. It is hoped that this group will lead a pathway for the future of microbiome research in Europe for the next decade.
June 27th was also World Microbiome Day – an initiative conceived and launched by APC back in 2018 and has grown in success and participation year-on-year with growing involvement from the public; scientific, health, dietary and business communities. This year saw a raft of activities across the globe including a World Microbiome Day-first webinar drawing almost 300 participants for interactive presentations and questions with a panel of international microbiome experts.
Speaking of Webinars the MiMIC (Missing Microbes in Infants born by C-section) project specifically held a progress-update webinar for the 500 participating mothers in the study and to thank them for making this important longitudinal study run in collaboration with industry partner IFF (International Food and Fragrances) such a success.
And there’s plenty to look forward in the coming autumnal months as we can continue to celebrate APC@20yrs including the IMCG (International Milk Genomics Conference) being help here at UCC from September 6-8th and our own annual APC Symposium on the 27th October which will give focus to some of our industry partnerships.
So please enjoy the rest of the Summer and mind your microbes!
All the best,
Paul
