Coordinator:

Margarida D. Amaral,
University of Lisbon,
Portugal

Vice-Coordinator:

Jeffrey Beekman,
University of Utrecht,
The Netherlands

Membership is open to any ECFS member, please  send a mail to info@ecfs.eu expressing your interest in joining the Working Group


Latest News:

We are very pleased to inform you that we will organise our 4th workshop in Lisbon, Portugal on 22 – 26 July 2019:

2019 Summer School on Epithelial Systems: Physiology and Pathophysiology  

Free Registration - Please click here for more details.

Some travel grants are available. Please communicate your potential interest when applying.

Application deadline: 31 May 2019.

Introduction

Aims and objectives of the Working Group

This working group aims to establish solid grounds for Molecular & Cell Biology and Physiology of Cystic Fibrosis through:

1) Widening the number of European scientists doing fundamental research on those areas of CF as ECFS members, in particular to attract, train and maintain younger investigators in the CF field;

2) Disseminating recommendations for best reagents (e.g. cell lines, compounds, antibodies, etc) on ECFS website and promoting best practice procedures (through organization of workshops, Summer schools);

3) Developing a network (jointly with ECFS-CTN and Registry) for the creation of biobanks of CF patients’ materials across Europe for the generation (e.g., primary cultures of epithelial cells, intestinal organoids, etc) and distribution of resources for CF research;

4) Producing consensus guidelines for standardization of research-derived laboratory techniques that can be applied to the clinic (e.g., novel biomarkers to be used in CF diagnosis or as "surrogate endpoints" for clinical trials, etc. )

5) Prioritizing topics related to emergent needs in the field so as to create "task forces" (e.g., on CFTR structure, animal models, high-throughput screens, etc.);

6) Promoting excellence in CF research by fostering European-scale research to avoid effort duplication at national level and fragmentation and to achieve competitiveness for EU consortia

7) Liaising with basic scientists in other societies and patients association to maximize and optimize efforts