The Institute of Biotechnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences is a Partner in a Successful OP JAK Project

The Institute of Biotechnology of the Czech Academy of Sciences (BTÚ) has achieved significant success in the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports' Operational Programme Jan Amos Komenský (OP JAK) – Intersectoral Cooperation.

Our institute is a proud partner of the Multi-omics Platform project, which will receive substantial financial support amounting to nearly 100 million CZK. The project was ranked as the second-best among all 82 submitted projects.

The Multi-omics Platform project, aimed at identifying biological correlates of diseases and developing new diagnostic, preventive, and therapeutic methods, is led by Professor Stanislav Kmoch. It brings together five top-tier institutions with excellent scientific capacities. Among these institutions is the Gene Expression Laboratory led by Mikael Kubista from our Institute of Biotechnology. This project investigates genetically determined diseases, both rare and common, and develops new diagnostic and therapeutic methods using state-of-the-art technologies.

Prof. Kubista and colleagues pioneered high throughput single cell multiomics in 2020 and specialize today on single cell and spatial technologies studying embryonic development, healing, reactive astrogliosis, how to mitigate consequences of stroke and liquid biopsy based multimarker diagnostics. Most recently Radek Sindelka’s team identified the Regeneration Initiating Cells (RICs) ubiquitous for scar free healing. BTU also operates the Gene Core; a single cell profiling service facility with 19 years of experience under the management of Lukas Valihrach.

The project strengthens long-standing collaboration between the First Faculty of Medicine of Charles University, the Institute of Biotechnology of the CAS, and the Institute of Microbiology of the CAS, which operate at the BIOCEV research center, along with two successful innovative application partners, GeneSpector, s. r. o., and Affipro, s. r. o. These companies were historically established as spin-offs of Charles University and the Institute of Microbiology.

The Institute of Biotechnology will continue to support and develop similar projects that have the potential to bring about significant changes in medical research and practice. This success is evidence that our scientific teams are excelling in their fields. Investment in science and research is key to future progress and innovation.

SOURCE: TZ 1.LF