First annual meeting of the COST Action ProteoCure

Ljubljana, Slovenia, May 17-19, 2022

The COST Action Proteocure aims at gathering European research teams and companies sharing the objective to develop new approaches and strategies to selectively manipulate protein fate for therapeutic or biotechnological purposes.

In this first meeting of our Action, we aim to bring together people from academia and from the clinical and industrial sectors, and to cover as many of the different fields of Proteostasis as possible, ranging from biological sciences including protein modification and protein turnover to diseases and molecular chemistry. To potentiate collaborations and scientific exchange, we will have as many short talks delivered by ProteoCure members as doable.

Keynote speakers:

• Plenary Speaker:Boris Turk (Ljubljana, SI)

• Session 1 (WG1): Proteostasis in acute and chronic disease

  • Keynote speaker: Wiep Scheper (Center for Neurogenomics & Cognitive Research, NL)

• Session 2 (WG2): Drugging Proteostasis with small molecules or bioactive compounds

  • Keynote speaker: Oded Kleifeld (Technion, IL)

• Session 3 (WG2): Proteolysis: roles, mechanism and players.

  • Keynote speaker: Ivan Dikic (Goethe University, Frankfurt, DE)

• Session 4 (WG2): Proteostasis at the interface between discovery science, the clinic and pharma.

  • Keynote speaker: Nik Subramanian (Kantify, BE)

Full program available here

The European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) is a funding organisation for the creation of research networks, called COST Actions. These networks offer an open space for collaboration among scientists across Europe (and beyond).

The ProteoCure COST Action aims at fostering research and innovation in the field of proteolysis with the goal of manipulating the proteolysis machinery for the development of novel, specific and efficient therapies.

Proteins are essential molecular actors in every cellular process. From their synthesis to their degradation, they are subject to continuous and precise quality control mechanisms to ensure that they properly and timely take on their functions to fulfil cellular needs.

Proteostasis (i.e. the complex network of biological pathways that control protein fate) and proteolysis (i.e. degradation of proteins) are key biological processes that directly controls individual protein quality, functions and levels. Malfunctions of these processes lead to accumulation of deleterious proteins or in the opposite to depletion of beneficial ones, and are therefore implicated in multiple human diseases such as cancers, neurodegeneration, developmental and aging disorders, as well as in infectious diseases. Therefore, manipulating these machineries to control abundance of specific proteins is a strategy of enormous potential for therapeutic intervention.

ProteoCure will gather European researchers from the academic, clinical, and industry sectors, interested to develop a knowledge-based network fostering research on this issue. By organizing community-building activities, fostering synergies among European scientists and reinforcing the training of the next generation of European researchers, the Action will allow creation of a large and creative exchange hub focusing on normal and pathologic proteolysis, and on the development of innovative tools modulating the level of specific protein(s). The final aim is to facilitate the translation of novel discoveries into products of clinical and/or economical value.