Coronavirus

SPEEDING UP THE TESTING OF DRUGS AGAINST THE SARS-COV-2 VIRUS!

November 18th, 2021. In collaboration with the team of Dr. Stephana Carelli at the Sacco Hospital in Milano, our team led by Claudio Conci and Bianca Barzaghini today entered a virology facility of Biohazard level 3, to test a new imaging window mounted in embryonated chicken eggs. We are testing this platform for a rapid, objective and real-time quantification of the response to drugs of endothelia damaged by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. This project was funded by Get it! Twice and by the COVID-19 award at the S2P2020 competition.

A NEW EXCITING PROJECT AT THE START!

September 1st, 2021. In collaboration with the team of Dr. Stephana Carelli and Prof. Gloria Pelizzo at Università degli Studi di Milano, our team started a new ambitious project today. The project is entitled “Mesenchymal stromal cells secretome in chronic lung diseases: validation study as a novel therapeutic option to treat pulmonary fibrosis induced by COVID-19”. Funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research under the call FISR-COVID 2020, the aim of this project is to test the use of adipose tissue-derived mesenchymal stem cell (MSCs) secretome, obtained using the NICHOID substrate and the MOAB bioreactor, for a possible clinical translation to cure paediatric pulmonary fibrosis induced by COVID-19. See the details of this new challenging project at the project page LUNGCHILDMSC!

OUR INNOVATIVE PLATFORM TO TEST DRUGS AGAINST THE CORONAVIRUS!

December 14th, 2020. The team led by the PI Claudio Conci today won a double prize for a new industrial project. The  project will adapt a miniaturized and innovative imaging window called the MICROATLAS, to be implanted in eggs containing living chicken embryos. The platform will be used for a rapid, objective and real-time quantification of the response to drugs and vaccines of damaged endothelia. The team has already obtained a patent for the MICROATLAS and validated the imaging technique in healthy chicken embryos thanks to funding from the Italian Ministry of Research (MUR) through the project BEYOND. This project will create a commercial version of the platform, to study the action of drugs in embryos with a pharmacologically-induced endothelial damage which recapitulates the pathogenesis caused by viral agents such as the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The project won both the Get it! Twice award and the COVID-19 award! Congratulations to all the team, especially to the younger members Bianca Barzaghini and Claudio Conci (in the pic, wearing a thematic necktie).

Italian Healthcare World, November 10th, 2020

Invited talk at the 7th annual congress of the European society for translational medicine on COVID-19 (EUSTM-2020)  

September 22, 2020. The PI Manuela T. Raimondi presents a talk on “Bioengineering tools to speed up the discovery and preclinical testing of vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 and therapeutic agents for COVID-19” at this virtual congress.  Watch the whole half-hour talk:

GREAT NEWS: WE PUBLISHED A NEW ARTICLE TO FIGHT AGAINST THE CORONAVIRUS!

May 18, 2020. A new Review article on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 authored by the team now online on Theranostics (IF 8.579): Raimondi MT,  Donnaloja F,  Barzaghini B, Bocconi A, Conci C, Parodi V, Jacchetti E, Carelli S. Bioengineering tools to speed up the discovery and preclinical testing of vaccines for SARS-CoV-2 and therapeutic agents for COVID-19. Theranostics 2020; 10(16):7034-7052. doi:10.7150/thno.47406. Available from: doi:10.7150/thno.47406

A declaration of the PI on the coronavirus pandemic.

April 28th, 2020. Manuela Raimondi took part in a project of digital communication entitled “OUR OUTLOOK ON TOMORROW” promoted by the Italian Association “100 Esperte”. This association is aimed at giving visibility to female scientists through a database that can be consulted by the media to find experts in any field of knowledge: www.100esperte.it.