Infection and immunity week
News

Joint symposium of HZI and McGill University on personalised infection medicine

Guests can participate online in the event on 29 November

The Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research (HZI) in Braunschweig and the McGill Interdisciplinary Initiative in Infection and Immunity (MI4) at McGill University in Montréal, Canada, are organising a joint symposium on personalised infection medicine on 29 November. Three researchers from each of the two institutions will give lectures on various topics of personalised infection medicine. The keynote lecture will be given by Prof Ugur Sahin, co-founder and CEO of BioNTech SE. The symposium kicks off McGill University's “Infection and Immunity Week”, which celebrates its 200th anniversary this year. Interested scientists can register to follow the event online.

Personalised infection medicine aims to take into account individual differences in the diagnosis and therapy of infectious diseases. The HZI and McGill University have been building a strategic cooperation on this topic for several years. Clinicians and scientists from the institutions will come together for a symposium on 29 November 2021 to share their perspectives and complementary expertise. Researchers worldwide will be able to follow the event via livestream. Prof Ugur Sahin from BioNTech SE will hold the keynote lecture of the symposium. The company has developed the first vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 approved in the EU. It is also studying individualised immunotherapies against cancer. The HZI is represented by the following speakers:

  • Prof Gérard Krause, Head of the Department “Epidemiology”
  • Prof Yang Li, Head of the Department “Computational Biology for Individualised Medicine” at the Centre for Individualised Infection Medicine (CiiM), a joint institution of HZI and Hannover Medical School
  • Prof Chase Beisel, head of the research group “RNA Synthetic Biology” at the Helmholtz Institute for RNA-based Infection Research (HIRI), a joint institution of HZI and Julius-Maximilians University of Würzburg.

Last year, the two institutions already hosted a successful mini-symposium focusing on coronavirus research.

Further information:

Portrait Jennifer Debarry

Press contact

Dr Jennifer Debarry
Head of Office