Expert meeting about commercialisation of marine biotechnology

On October 11th, I went to Faro (University of Algarve) to attend an expert meeting about commercialisation of marine biotechnology. The meeting was arranged by the Royal Embassy of Norway, and the participants consisted of both Norwegian and Portuguese scientists, companies and funding agencies. The aim of the meeting was to generate a basis for bilateral scientific and industrial collaborations within the field between the two countries and to inform the participants about available funding resources for their collaborations. A brief summary of the meeting can be found here (in Portuguese):

We had round table discussions about potential collaboration topics (picture taken by 

Åshild Fløgstad Svensson from the Embassy)

As a result of this meeting I’m going to meet scientists from the University of Azores and BioCant in Cantanhede (close to Coimbra) next week, to discuss potential future collaboration projects between these two groups, my research associates at the University of Tromsø (UiT) and me here at the ITQB. The idea is work out collaboration projects for which we will apply for funding from both The Research Council of Norway (RCN) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) in Portugal.

I really appreciate this initiative from the Norwegian Embassy in Portugal and I hope they follow up on it. During the meeting it was clearly illustrated that there is a big potential for collaborative projects within marine biotechnology which both countries would benefit from in the future, and there are funding recourses available for this both in Norway and in Portugal. However, for purely scientific collaborations there is still a job to do, and my wish is that the RCN and the FCT establishes a bilateral research programme from which we could apply directly for funding for collaborations with fellow Portuguese scientists.

If I had not been here in Portugal doing my Marie Curie fellowship I would never have been invited (or invited myself as I in fact did) to go to this meeting. I think this illustrates very well the value of going abroad for some time during your research career. I have now been able to establish new scientific contacts which I would never get if I was working in Norway at this moment.


By the way, Faro is a nice place to visit, and it takes less than three hours to get there from Lisbon by car. I really envy the Portuguese their highway system - we can only dream about have something like that in Norway :-)

Anaerobic conditions and holidays

The last couple of weeks we have faced some problems in the lab, but we have overcome them, and are now ready for the EPR experiment next week. This time we purified our protein anaerobically, which means that we have performed all the work in an anaerobic chamber (it looks more or less like the one in the photo from the manufacturer Belle Technology). This makes the work a bit more cumbersome, since you have to remove the oxygen from all the solutions and the equipment you are using for the purification, and do all the work inside the chamber using thick gloves. I'm sure Margarida agrees with me, since she did most of the work in the chamber which is located in one of the cold rooms :-)

Tomorrow (October 5th) it is a holiday in Portugal. It is the Republic day, "Implantação da República", which celebrates the end of the monarchy and the beginning of the Portuguese republic in 1910. Due to the financial crisis in the country it has been decided to cancel this holiday from next year on, so it is the last time the Portuguese will have this holiday. So, I should perhaps say, happy last Republic holiday! Not so sure the people will really enjoy it since it looks like most of them will face a 4% increase in tax from next year on…..

Article about my project in "Forskerforum"

Oh, and I almost forgot to tell you that an article about my research has been published in the Journal for the members of the The Norwegian Association of Researchers (NAR) , "Forskerforum". In an interview with my PhD student Kjersti Lian they are describing our interest in studying the DNA repair systems in Deinococcus radiodurans :-) Read the whole article here (page 26-28)! Kjersti, thank you for your effort!!!







Travelling, holidays and new techniques

In the end of July I went to Grenoble, to visit my PhD student who at the time was working in the lab of Dr. Joanna Timmins at the Institut de Biologie Structurale (IBS). I had two good days there, discussing the last results and making plans for the last six months of the project. It is always good to come to Grenoble. I have been a visitor in the Structural Biology Group at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) a couple of times, so it's almost like coming home:-)

In August, I went on holidays...... in Portugal. It is really a wonderful country, which has so many interesting places to visit. This time I went to Caramulo, a small town in the centre of the country, relatively close to Viseu. Even though it is a very small place it has a very nice museum, Museu do Caramulo, with a big art and car collection - not the kind of museum you expect to find in a small place like this. Other than the museum, the place the ideal for hiking, and resting :-) The landscape in this region it very beautiful and I'm definitely going back there - but then also spending time visiting the Dão wineries!!!

Ok, back to work I went to Norway, to visit my old lab at the University of Tromsø. It was nice to be back, to meet my old colleagues and friends again. I had meetings with my PhD students, and other collaborators to discuss manuscripts which is almost ready for submission :-)

In between all this travelling, we have prepared more protein samples for a new EPR experiment which will take place in October. We also had meetings with the head of the Raman Spectroscopy group here at the ITQB, Smilja Todorovic, in order to discuss the possibility of doing some experiments with my proteins. Raman spectroscopy seems very complicated to me, and they need very concentrated samples for the analysis (~ 30 mg/ml - fortunately only 2 µl), but it will give us more information about the state and nature of the metal centres of my proteins which is one of the main goals of the project. I think now I’m really benefitting from performing my project a multidisciplinary institute, having the luxury of just going up one floor to find a fully equipped Raman spectroscopy lab and all the expertise you need to get the experiment done and the results analysed. I really look forward to learn more about this technique.

And next week I'll finally start learning the Portuguese language at the Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da Universidade Nova de Lisboa. It will be a busy autumn :-)

Monitoring visit

Yesterday Project Officer Zakaria Benameur from the European Commission came to the ITQB for a monitoring visit. The aim of the visit was to monitor both scientific and administrative aspects of my Marie Curie fellowship. He first spent two hours with the administration at the ITQB, and then one hour with me and the Scientist in Charge of the project Professor Maria Arménia Carrondo. I gave a presentation about the background of my project and an update on the status so far. After the meeting I gave Mr. Benameur a short visit of the research facilities of the Macromolecular Crystallography Unit.

I think it was nice and very useful to have this monitoring visit. I got some new ideas about other funding resources within the European Commission I can apply for in order to continue my research when the money for this project runs out. It was also nice to actually meet the person who I have exchanged several e-mails with after my project was selected for funding within the Marie Curie programme J

With a new picture I found of the ITQB (nice surroundings for research) I wish you a nice weekend!

The ITQB day

Today it is the ITQB day, and we have now attended a gathering in the auditorium, with speeches by the ITQB director and the principal of Universidade Nova de Lisboa and people who where rewarded for their scientific work in 2011. Soon we will go to the “Sardinhada”, were there will be served grilled sardines (typical for Portugal), meat for the cowards (including me) and refreshments J And the party will go on for some time I think.....

Bom fim de semana/Have a nice weekend!

Technical problems and monitoring visit

It has been quiet here for some time now.... We have had some problems with the protein purification due to some technical issues, thus we are a couple of weeks behind schedule :-( This made us postpone the planned EPR experiments, which may only take place in September now. We'll see. However, instead of the EPR we will try to perform Raman spectroscopy - another cool technique which also allows us to study the state of the metal centres in my proteins.

It is also clear that the ITQB will be visited by a project officer from the European Commision on July 12th. The aim of the visit is to monitor both administrative and scientific aspects of my Marie Curie fellowship. It will be an interesting day I think, both for the officer and for us, and we hope he will return to Brussels with positive impressions from his visit :-)

Até logo/see you soon

Back from work in Norway

Then I’m back in Portugal after spending a week in my old lab at the University of Tromsø. It was really nice to be back and meet old colleagues and friends again, and also to be back in the town I have lived in for 14 years (see picture)! The aim of going north was to meet up with my two PhD students who I still supervise on a distance from the ITQB, tidy up in my stuff which is still stored in freezers there, and also bring some material which I need for my project in Portugal. I had also planned to do one experiment, but as always I was a bit too ambitious…

Now I’m facing a couple of weeks with protein purification in order to prepare new samples for the next EPR experiment J

See you soon!

PhD defence and Norways national day

On Friday last week Susana Gonçalves defended her PhD thesis here at the ITQB. Susana and I spent some time in the lab of the Structural Biology Group at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) at the same time in 2005 (I think...), so it was great to be present at her PhD defence (and celebration :-).

After a 20 min. presentation and examination by four (out of six) members of the jury, she recieved the diploma which proves that she is now Dr. Gonçalves! CONGRATULATION!



On May 17th it was "Dia de Noruega", the Norwegian national day! I was invited to a reception at the Norwegian ambassador’s residence, and went there to celebrate the day together with other Norwegians, diplomats from other countries and guests from Portugal. It was very nice, and a good opportunity to meet other Norwegians living in Portugal.

Have a nice weekend!

My first results

During the last few weeks, I have been producing three of the proteins I'm studying during this project. They all have an iron-sulfur cluster and are therefore yellow/brownish at high concentration (see picture). One aim of my project is to analyse wheter this iron-sulfur cluster contributes with electrons in order for the protein to repair damaged DNA. One technique you can use to analyse this is Electron Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR), and yesterday I performed the first analysis of my proteins by EPR. I don't know much about this technique yet, but I'm here to learn more about it as part of my project. From the very preliminar results we got yesterday I'm convinced we will gain new knowlegde about this class of enzymes which in the end will teach us more about their contribution for the maintenance of our genome :-) The experiment was performed in collaboration with Professor Miguel Teixeira at the Metalloproteins and Bioenergetics Unit at the ITQB.

By the way, this week the heat finally arrived, and I think it was about 28C yesterday. Unfortunately I haven't been able to enjoy it as much yet since I'm working, but during the weekend I will go the beach :-)

Have a nice weekend!

My first group seminar

The MX unit has group meetings every Wednesday at 10.00, where members of the unit present recent results or papers within macromolecular crystallography. Today it was my turn and I presented the project I have been working on for some time now, and my plans for the Marie Curie fellowship. 

Here you have a couple of pictures of crystal structures I talked about today - uracil DNA N-glycosylase (UNG) and mismatch specific uracil DNA glycosylase (MUG) from Deinococcus radiodurans (DEIRA). They were the first crystal structures of DNA glycosylases from DEIRA which were published (in 2005 and 2006), and you can read more about them by following the links!

Writing the Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship (IEF) proposal for career development

Well then, let me share some experience about the writing of the proposal.

First you have to find a European research unit which is willing to be your host. Second, you have to download the call fiche, the work programme and the guides for applicants, read them carefully and design a project which answers to their requests. The application consists of a part A, which has to be taken care of by your host institution and a part B, which you (the fellow/project proposer) have to take care of. In the specific guide for the call you will find a template for part B. Here it is stated very specifically what you have to include in your application. Make sure you include text which covers all the requests.

In part B you have to include some information about the host institution. I advice you to contact your host institution as early as possible in order to get this information/help writing it.

You also have to provide names and contact details of up to three scientists who know you, who can submit reference letters on your behalf. Contact your references well in advance and remind them about the submission deadline when it is getting close.

My proposal was designed based on research I was already doing, and I could use some text that I had written before, but still it took me at least four weeks to write the proposal. Thus, start well in advance before the deadline.

Also, use your national contact point for the Marie Curie action if you have any questions or doubts. They are there for you and are always very helpful.

My timeline:

January 2011: Information meeting at the University of Tromsø about the Marie Curie action

March 2011: Call published

March – June 2011: Reading/project design

July 2011: Writing of the proposal

July 8^th 2011: Contacted my host institution

August 5^th 2011: Contacted references

August 11^th 2011: Submitted proposal – deadline August 12^th

December 2011: Result published – invited to negotiation

January 2012: Submitted negotiation forms

April 1^st 2012: Project start J

Good luck!!!

Sick children, booking systems and proofs

Your children doesn't stop being sick even if you are a Marie Curie fellow, so this week it was full stop in the lab work. Fortunately the MX-unit at the ITQB has an excellent online instrument booking (and unbooking) system (WikiXtal) which makes it easy to manage your planned lab-activities without generating too much trouble for your fellow equipment users. This Wiki page also possesses all general methods which are being used in the lab, and other relevant information for the group. A very nice system which I think is worth spending time and energy to implement in any research lab!

And finally - ending the week by correcting proofs of a paper which is going to published in Acta Crystallographica Section D: Biological Crystallography very soon. Tedious but pleasant work!

Have a nice weekend!

Finally in the lab

After spending some time making plans for the progress of the project, I have finally started working in the lab :-) I'm just doing some basic stuff - its a good way to start in order to learn where different things are and to get insight into the routines of the lab of my host - the Macromolecular Crystallography Unit.

My first day as a Marie Curie fellow

Today is my first day as a Marie Curie fellow, and it feels good to get going. I submitted the proposal in August 2011, recieved the message that the proposal was granted in December 2011, and now on April 2nd 2012 I'm already working on the project. I'll post more information about writing up the proposal later. Normally I work at the Norwegian Structral Biology Centre (NorStruct) at the University of Tromsø in Norway, and I can see that the temperature there is below 0C while it is 16C here in Oeiras. I do know which one I prefer :-)