News & Events

Date of the event: 02 June, 2015
Description: Key Note Lecture by Dr. Gary S. Stein during the Five Years Anniversary Ceremony of the Center for Biomedical Research, Andres Bello University. Dr. Stein is Professor and Chair of the Department of Biochemistry and Director of the University of Vermont Cancer Center, University of Vermont College of Medicine, at Burlington, VT, USA.

Date of the event: 05 April, 2015
Description: El Mercurio. Investigadores UNAB describen desconocida red de conexiones cerebrales. http://buscador.emol.com/noticias/Jimmy+Stehberg

Date of the event: 12 April, 2015
Description: Seminar of Dr. Martin Montecino at the University of Regensburg, Regensburg, Germany.

Date of the event: 21 April, 2015.
Description: El Mercurio. Las secuelas del estrés postraumático infantil en el cerebro: http://buscador.emol.com/noticias/Jimmy+Stehberg

Date of the event: 11 March, 2015
Description: Seminar of Dr. Martin Montecino at the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, University of Massachusetts Medical School, at Worcester, MA, USA.

Date of the event: 02 September, 2014
Description: The Centro de Investigación Biomédicas participated in the Ice Bucket Challenge to stimulate awareness of ALS. Click here

Date of the event: 14 June, 2014.
Description: El Mercurio. Dormir menos se volvió un mal hábito que sale caro. Click here

Date of the event: 22 April, 2014.
Description: Radio Bio-Bio, con Julio César Rodríguez. Científicos trabajan en píldora que ayudaría a eliminar efectos derivados de hechos traumáticos. Click here
Date of the event: 22 April, 2014.
Description: La Cuarta. Píldora creada en Chile ayudará a dejar atrás las penas. Click here
Date of the event: 30, Jan, 2014
Description: The I Simposio Anual de Memoria y Estrés took place at UNAB, with more tan 200 attendees. The event, which was organized by Dr. Stehberg from the CIB, included lecturers from Chile and Argentina speaking about State of the Art research on Memory and Stress. Participating lecturers include Jimmy Stehberg (CIB), Victor Molina (Universidad de Córdoba, Argentina), Alejandro DeLorenzi,(Universidad de Buenos Aires), Lorena Varela (CIB), Ursula Wyneken (U. de Los Andes), Juan Carlos Sáez (PUC), Verónica Larach (UNAB), Katia Gysling (PUC), Raúl Riquelme (U. de Chile), Ricardo Fernández (UNAB), Fernando Bustos (CIB), Magdalena Sanhueza (U. de Chile), Danilo González-Nilo (UNAB) y Luis Velásquez (UNAB). The event had the support from Sociedad Chilena de Neurociencia, Sociedad Chilena de Salud Mental and Corfo. Click here

13th February 2013:

First CIB Master student to travel to University of Heidelberg (Mannheim, Germany) to start exchange program of the international project EULAMDIMA

Recently CIB investigators have been awarded for the coming 4 years (2013-2016) the international grant “EULAMDIMA” (see news 26-27 Noviembre 2012 for more information).

For this exchange program, as from February 13th Paulina Nuñez, Master student of “Ingeniería en Biotecnología”, has traveled to the University of Heidelberg (Mannheim, Germany) to partcipate in a course and conduct research work for 3 months that is related to her thesis work on pain perception, under the guidance of tutors Jimmy Stehberg and Brigitte van Zundert. Paulina will focus her stay on studying the activity of the pain receptors P2X3 and TRPV1 using behavioral studies and calcium imaging assays. This work will performed in the laboratories of  Drs. Treede Rolf-Detlef, Wolfgang Greffrath and Martin Schmetz, whose research is focussed on peripheral transduction mechanisms of painful heat stimuli, central sensitization in the spinal cord, the development of tools to assess nociceptive pathways in patients as well as learning and memory in nociceptive pathways.

For additional information on this EULAMDIMA project, please contact Brigitte van Zundert.

26-27 November 2012:

Kick-off meeting of international project EULAMIDA with the participation of CIB investigators in Mannheim, Germany.

This year CIB investigators have been awarded for the coming 4 years (2013-2016) the international grant “EULAMDIMA-Joint European and Latin American Research Network onDiabetic Microangiopathy”. This International Research Staff Exchange Scheme (IRES) builds on a novel and unique international focus on microvascular mechanisms between University of Groningen (UMCG; the Netherlands), University of Heidelberg (UHEI; Gernany), UNAM (Mecico) and UNAB (Chile). At this moment our UNAB research team includes Martin Montecino (CIB-UNAB), Jimmy Stehberg (CIB-UNAB), Alvaro Elorza (UNAB) and Brigitte van Zundert (CIB-UNAB), who is also Director of the UNAB research team; however, additional investigators are welcomed to particpate. Because the funding is focussed to finance traveling of our young researchers to enable them to participate in courses and laboratory work at the different universities this grant will give our Master and Doctoral students and Postdoctoral fellows the unique opertunity to visit these partner universities; in fact, during the coming 4 years, 10 students/postdocs will visit UHEI and UMCG for 3-6 months to particpate in different courses and perform experiments related to their research project. In addition, Chile will receive 6-8 students/postdocs and 4 PIs from overboard who will receive the course “Training in exploring life cell analyses en diabetis related disorders” and conduct research in the different laboraties that are part of this grant proposal. The collaborations that will be established in this exchange grant will be crucial to build a platform to prepare in the nearer future an international research proposal tacking key questions in basic and translational biomedical research.

For additional information on this EULAMDIMA project, please contact Brigitte van Zundert.

23-27 th October 2012:

CIB investigators organize and participate in practical outreach program for The Chilean Society of Cell Biology in Puerto Varas.

In continuation of a pilot outreach program conducted in 2011, this year the Coordinators of The Chilean Society for Cell Biology, CIB investigator Brigitte van Zundert together with Eliseo Campos (PUC), invited approximately 150 high school students (3th and 4th year) from 5 different schools of Puerto Varas and Puerto Montt to participate in a practical 2.5 hour duration workshop focused on several aspects of cell biology. With the generous help of Gene X-Press, students had access to 15 phase-contrast microscopes and 15 binocular microscopes. With the phase-contrast microscopes, they were able to examine brain samples from transgenic mouse models of the neurodegenerative disease Alzheimer´s disease and observe for example amyloid plaques; the samples were kindly donated by Dr. Nibaldo Inestrosa (PUC). With the binocular microscopes, the students were able to observe live-time the movement of transgenicCaenorhabditis elegans strains with defects in locomotion; samples were kindly provided by Drs. Rebeca Aldunate (UST) and Alicia Minniti (PUC) who also taught during the workshop students to study these nematode worms. Attached are some pictures of the event. It is important to note that students were very enthusiastic and honored to participate in this workshop and hoped that this event will be repeated in next year´s meeting. After completion of the practical workshop the students visited the poster sessions presented by students and postdocs of the SBCCH; excitingly, several students actively participated and even asked interesting questions to the presenter.

We hope to repeat this program next year and to include some additional activities for high school teachers to improve their knowledge of cell biology. We sincerely thank Gene X-press for installing and providing the microscopes, and students David González and Fabiola Rojas from CIB-UNAB, and Pedro Cisternas, Juan Francisco Codocedo, Carla Montecinos, and Valerie Ramírez from PUC for their participation! If you have additional ideas or are willing to participate during our next annual meeting please contact [email protected].

5 th October 2012:

CIB investigator Brigitte van Zundert participates in “Neuroscience Celebration – Fiesta de Neurociencia”.

Each year the program EXPLORA of Conicyt organizes a national scientific program for children, teachers and lay people to disseminate Science and Technology in Chile (http://www.conicyt.cl/573/article-3310.html). This year, the program focused on the brain by organizing a “Neuroscience Celebration – Fiesta de Neurociencia” where approximately 24.300 persons participated. In October 2012, a Brain Science Fair was organized in “Parque Quinta Normal” in Santiago for 3 days where children were able to go to conferences, participate in brain games and present their own data in poster form. CIB investigator Brigitte van Zundert presented a talk “why are children smarter than adults” before a packed and enthusiastic audience of around 100 children between the ages of 12 and 16 years old. In the picture two students that participated in the conference and indicated that they were moved and inspired by the conference.