MICROGENNET · Extension, enhancement and strengthening of established collaborations for the purpose of a community-driven knowledge base for micronutrient genomics
FP7 — People (Marie Curie Actions)
- Duration
- 2012-01-01 → 2015-12-31
- EU contribution
- €180,600
- Participants
- 8
- Scheme
- MC-IRSES
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners. CORDIS does not always give exact coordinates for projects before 2014. These points are placed at city or country level.
Results in brief
Extension, enhancement and strengthening of established collaborations for the purpose of a community-driven knowledge base for micronutrient genomics
MICROGENNET has started in January 2012 as a collaboration between 16 distinguished universities and research institutes worldwide for a period of 4 years. The overall aim was to build, extend and strengthen sustainable collaborations between the partners to create a community driven knowledge base for micronutrient genomics research. The expertise and facilities of the partners are highly complementary and the synergy lies in the combination of expertise.This expertise made it possible to identify metabolic and functional target pathways of micronutrients relevant to health questions. These health questions are mainly centered around the micronutrients, selenium, zinc, carotenoids, folate and vitamins B, C and D. MICROGENNET finished in December 2015 and at http://www.microgennet.org in a MediaWiki suit, a complete overview of MICROGENNET is given. This wiki is used to communicate between the partners. It is part of a larger wiki at http://www.micronutrientgenomics.org which serves as a means to communicate with the micronutrient community as a whole. The latter wiki will give access to the MICROGENNET project sub wiki after the end of the project. All partners can view and add content to the wiki creating an interactive and open environment. Importantly, the MICROGENNET partners created a collection of micronutrient-relevant pathways.These pathways are shared with the whole research community via a popular and commonly used online pathway curation platform, WikiPathways. A micronutrient-dedicated portal in WikiPathways is available with a broad collection of micronutrient-relevant pathways, see http://micronutrients.wikipathways.org. In total 23 researchers went on a MICROGENNET exchange and these exchanges had a total duration of 40 months, resulting in (i) thirteen published research papers, (ii) several conference abstracts, (iii) new research proposals and (iv) training of (junior) researchers to learn methods and tools important for micronutrient genomics research. The pathways developed and the pathway and network biology approaches used and taught to researchers involved allows evaluation of micronutrient research data in the context of the understanding that we have about biological processes. That will help increase the actual understanding obtained from such studies as is shown in the published papers. This increased understanding is expected to lead to research interpretations that are more useful for policy making with respect to adviced intakes. Contact address Prof. dr. Chris Evelo Department of Bioinformatics-BiGCaT, Maastricht University PO Box 616, 6200 MD Maastricht, the Netherlands chris.evelo@maastrichtuniversity.nl
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
MICROGENNET is a collaboration of 16 distinguished universities and research institutes worldwide. The overall aim of the exchange programme is to build, extend and strengthen sustainable collaborations between the partners so as to create a community driven knowledge base for micronutrient genomics research. Currently, the data on nutrient effects on health are scattered in publications and databases around the world. The aim of this work is to provide a public portal and bioinformatics toolbox to access and analyse collaborative and publically available data. Ultimately the goal is to develop individualized intake recommendations for specific micronutrients to promote prevention of both acute illness and chronic disease.The exchange objective is provide researchers with: an international platform to learn novel techniques and methods, the opportunity to formulate new joint collaborative research and funding proposals and international exposure and intercultural understanding. The exchange programme consists of visits ranging from 1-7 months for ESRs and ERs. The expertise and facilities of the partners are highly complementary and the synergy lies in the combination of expertise on identifying metabolic and functional target pathways for a range of micronutrients (Selenium, Zinc , Vitamins and vitamin-related compounds anti-oxidants) and bioinformatics expertise on pathway analysis and data integration. The concise work plan consists of 4 work packages, 2 related to data collection concerning minerals and vitamins, a third over-arching bioinformatic workpackage and one for management. The consortium will be sustainable through its close association with the Micronutrient Genomics Project and the Europe-led NuGO association. MICROGENNET contributes to the EC priorities because it uses mobility to transfer knowledge and will create a network through which European centres of excellence will enhanced through links with researchers from the rest of the world.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSITEIT MAASTRICHT · MaastrichtCoordinatorNetherlands
- CENTRE INTERNATIONAL DE RECHERCHE SUR LE CANCER · Lyon 7emeFrance
- CONSIGLIO PER LA RICERCA IN AGRICOLTURA E L'ANALISI DELL'ECONOMIA AGRARIA · ROMAItaly
- ISTITUTO NAZIONALE DI RICERCA PER GLI ALIMENTI E LA NUTRIZIONE · ROMACity levelItaly
- ITA-SUOMEN YLIOPISTO · KUOPIOFinland
- KOBENHAVNS UNIVERSITET · KOBENHAVNDenmark
- THE UNIVERSITY COURT OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN · AberdeenUnited Kingdom
- UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE · Newcastle Upon TyneUnited Kingdom
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union