Exchange of the immunology community on the Upper Rhine

At the end of October, immunologists from the Eucor universities met in Basel to exchange ideas – including the doctoral candidates from the EURIdoc programme.

The Biozentrum at the University of Basel was a hive of activity on 25 October. Numerous scientists from the Eucor Universities of Basel, Freiburg and Strasbourg as well as the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology share research findings, listen to presentations and engage in discussions. They all work in the field of immunology and know each other well. Together they form the Upper Rhine Immunology Group, or URI group for short, and meet here for the annual URI meeting. The network can look back on years of collaboration and has a joint doctoral programme under the umbrella of Eucor – The European Campus since 2021: EURIdoc. 24 young researchers are doing their doctorates as part of this programme, which is funded by the European Union.

Nagwa Ibrahim is a doctoral candidate on the EURIdoc programme and conducts research in the group of Prof. Véronique Orian-Rousseau at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. She is investigating a protein called CD44. This protein promotes the growth of tumors and metastasis. She is focusing on pancreatic cancer and how CD44 expressed on a certain type of immune cell, known as macrophages, impacts tumor progression. ‘In the long term, this may lead to possible treatment approaches for pancreatic cancer,’ she says. Nagwa Ibrahim has a background in pharmacy. She studied in Alexandria (Egypt) and Nottingham (UK) and has worked in the pharmaceutical industry. The trinational doctoral programme EURIdoc attracted her to the Upper Rhine. ‘I enjoy the freedom that scientific work gives me,’ she says. At the URI meeting, she takes advantage of the variety of lectures and the opportunity to exchange ideas with her EURIdoc colleagues and others. ‘I still want to learn a lot. There is so much expertise here, I don't have enough time for everything!’

Agnibesh Dey is also excited to meet his colleagues from the EURIdoc programme in Basel. ‘We may be at different locations here on the Upper Rhine, but we know each other and the local exchange is good for us.’ He studied biotechnology in Calcutta (India) and Syndey (Australia) before coming to the Upper Rhine. He is doing his doctorate at the University of Freiburg in the group of Prof. Philipp Henneke, where he is working on the immune response during prenatal infection with the cytomegalovirus. Agnibesh Dey is focussing in particular on the innate immune cells and how they behave during viral infection in the central nervous system. ‘If we understand the behaviour of these immune cells during infection, we can also use this knowledge to further develop the treatment of affected patients.

Both doctoral candidates also prepared a poster with their research approaches, methods and results to date. In the end, they were delighted that the poster by their EURIdoc colleague Annia Pérez Riverón from the Université de Strasbourg was voted best poster. Everyone took a lot away from the enriching exchange in Basel: Knowledge, ideas, new experiences and team spirit.