The four-day Summer School was oriented around the four major topics of Fraunhofer health research - Devices, Drugs, Data and Diagnostics, the "4D". The field of participants consisted of PhD students and young postdocs from research institutions (Fraunhofer, Robert Bosch Center for Tumor Diseases), university hospitals (Charité, Leipzig, Heidelberg, Würzburg), universities (Paris Lodron University of Salzburg, TU Berlin, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, University of Leipzig, Hannover Medical School, Hannover Biomedical Research School, Saarland University), a federal authority (PEI) and industry (Miltenyi Biotec, Novartis). During the four days, the participants listened to numerous excellent presentations from internal and external experts, pitched their own projects, and discussed existing problems and developed ideas in interdisciplinary groups.

Day 1 of the Summer School was focused on the first »D« - Data.

Valentina Eberlein, PhD student at Fraunhofer IZI and one of the spokespersons for the Fraunhofer CIMD Young Scientists Program, as well as the Fraunhofer CIMD office, welcomed the participants of the Summer School and briefly introduced the research cluster and the goals of the promotion of young researchers as well as the individual program points. This was followed by a round of getting to know each other, during which the participants were able to use a bingo questionnaire to ask each other about areas of their private and everyday working lives and to exchange ideas.

This was followed by the first lecture by Prof. Ulrich Dirnagl, Head of the Department of Experimental Neurology at the Charité Berlin, with an exciting perspective on how crucial statistics and the evaluation of results can be in preclinical research. Critical attention was given to the p-value, especially in the context of false-positive and false-negative results as well as effect sizes.

A short coffee break was followed by a presentation by Dario Antweiler, Team Leader Healthcare Analytics at Fraunhofer IAIS, with interesting insights into the field of machine learning, the practical use of artificial intelligence (AI)-based models and their limitations.

The last contribution of the day by Dr. Pierre-Nicolas Schwab, founder of IntoTheMinds, was dedicated to data visualization. Here, in an interactive presentation, very clear examples were used to demonstrate the impact and significance of good or bad data visualization. And what "good" data visualization actually means.

To get to know each other better and to network, the first day of the Summer School was rounded off by a joint barbecue evening.

 

 

 

Day 2 of the Summer School was focused on the second »D« - Drugs.

The day began with a presentation by Dr. Tamara Pfaff, Head of Preclinical Development at AiCuris, focusing on the importance of toxicology in drug development. Here, ICH-relevant basics and toxicologically relevant steps in clinical development were equally addressed.

This was directly followed by a presentation by Dr. Ulrich Blache, project manager at Fraunhofer IZI, from the field of cell and gene therapy development. Here, T-cell-based cancer immunotherapies and their range of applications were explained. Particular focus in this lecture was on natural killer cells (NK cells) and their modification.

After a short coffee break, the lecture of Dr. Schara Safarian, Head of Biotherapeutic Agents and Protein Design at Fraunhofer ITMP, followed with an introduction to the field of "proximity inducing drugs". After brief basics (inhibition/degradation), two areas were considered in more detail and placed in the context of current research: intracellular targets via ubiquitination and degradation in the proteosome (Protecs) and BioDegs which consist of chemically modified antibodies that trigger lysosomal uptake and degradation in the cells.

The concluding lecture by Prof. Gerhard Krönke, Chair of Rheumatology and Clinical Immunology at Charité and Head of Autoimmune Diagnostics, used a special case study to illustrate the challenges of modern therapy in the field of immune-mediated diseases (here: Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE)) and the potential of innovative therapeutic approaches on B cells.

After the lunch break, which also included time for extended exchange and networking, the last program item was the project pitches for the first half of the participants. Here, there was an opportunity to briefly present topics and research areas from their own daily work and to refer to the posters accordingly. The first poster session took place directly afterwards in the atrium of the Fraunhofer IZI. This not only enabled participants to get information beyond their own filed of work, but also led to a lively exchange of ideas and the identification of possible collaborations.

At the end of the day, a bus tour of Leipzig was planned, which gave the participants an impression of this city steeped in history and certainly gave them ideas about where to end the day after the tour was over.

Day 3 of the Summer School was focused on the third »D« - Devices.

At the beginning of the third day of the Summer School, Dr. Oliver Petters and Dr. Stephan Werk, Miltenyi Biotech, gave an impressive demonstration of the state of the art of systems for spatial imaging of three-dimensional samples of whole animals or organs. Brief insights into techniques that enable the imaging of smallest dimensions by permeabilization of samples were not less impressive, as was an overview of possibilities to display automatic images of multiple markers on sections by repetitive staining and bleaching or cleavage of antibodies and superimposition of images.

Dr. Mania Ackermann, Fraunhofer ITEM, then presented recent advances in "all-in-one" bioreactor-based production of immune cells for research. Based on the importance of a steady availability of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived immune cells, the bioreactors established a system that generates a stable and pure macrophage population without the need for feeding cells or animal sources.

Dr. Mandy Otto and Maximilian Fuchs, research associates at Fraunhofer ITEM, demonstrated in the subsequent talk how effective "science ping-pong" can look like by presenting the development of siRNA-loaded nanoparticle-based therapies based on bioinformatic profiling using the example of pulmonary fibrosis.

The final talk of the "Device Day" came from Dr. Christian Münzenmeyer, head of the Image Processing and Medical Technology department at Fraunhofer IIS. He showed how AI can act as an enabler for computational pathology and smart sensors, including basic steps in AI and data analysis, use in (digital) pathology, and long-term monitoring (development and validation in a clinical setting).

After the lunch break, the second part of the project pitches were performed, followed by the corresponding poster session in the atrium.

The day was rounded off by a joint visit to a Leipzig location.

Day 4 of the Summer School was focused on the fourth »D« - Diagnostics.

At the beginning of the fourth and last day of the Summer School, Dr. Gregor Hörmann, Munich Leukemia Laboratory MLL, presented the business area of MLL, as well as the status quo for automated processes in diagnostics. Here, automated processing, sample preparation and storage in freezing units, as well as pre-analyses and the role of AI for possible future automation including robotics were addressed.

The last talk of this year's Summer School was given by Dr. Julien Siebert, Fraunhofer IESE, and was dedicated to AI-based diagnostics. After a short background talk on what "Artificial Intelligence" (AI) actually is, goals such as implementing AI - intelligent machines and understanding the nature of intelligence - as well as possible tasks and different dimensions of AI were discussed. As a practical example, reference was made to the SATURN project (Smart Physician Portal for patients with unclear diseases), where AI is used to make diagnostic suggestions based on expert knowledge and real clinical data.

After the coffee break, the last thematic block followed, in which the participants were to work on various issues in interdisciplinary groups and discuss or develop concrete project challenges, problems and ideas.

A total of six project ideas were generated based on the following research questions:

-        How does a targeted delivery system work in a continuous flow (cardiac application)?

-        Can a disease pattern be defined that is associated with multiple organ comorbidities (overlapping targets, routes of administration) e.g., in the field of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), psoriasis (Pso), cardiomyopathy?

-        How can host immune responses to biotherapeutics be reduced by targeted delivery?

-        Can immune cell phenotypes be characterized in an organoid environment (context: triggering various immune-mediated diseases) and how might siRNA-based therapeutics or "organs-on-a-chip" methods be used here?

-        Can clinically relevant information from patients be presented to physicians in a more efficient (structured) way (target time 7-10 min per patient)?

-        Which oncogenic (RNA-) viruses induce skin cancer and which treatment options could be tested in an in vitro test system?

 

Overall, the Summer School was a successful continuation of Fraunhofer CIMD's promotion of young researchers for networking and collaboration among young scientists from a wide range of institutions beyond their current projects and topics. The research cluster would like to thank all speakers for the exciting impulses and the participants for their diverse project insights and active participation.