News
TecnATox members, coordinators of the SEEDS project, participated in the transnational project meeting organised in a hybrid format, on 29th and 30th of September 2022 in Turin, Italy, with the participation of the representatives of all partner organisations involved in the project. The meeting was an opportunity to review the project progress, to organise the project activities and to assign the last tasks for the remaining period till the end of the project. The SEEDS: Substance of circular Economy concept as Efficacious Determinant for the development of Successful entrepreneurship project (2020-1-ES01-KA202-083137) is Co-Funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union. More information about the project at: https://seeds.erasmus.site/es/
Pollution by microplastics is one of the most important environmental problems that humans face right now. In this line, researchers of TecnATox have just published a new article on this topic in the journal Water Research. The study focused on analyzing the concentration, morphology, and composition of microplastics in a drinking water treatment plant located close to Barcelona. The overall removal efficiency of the plant was calculated in more than 98%. According to their estimations, the intake of microplastics through drinking water would not be an important route compared to fish and seafood ingestion.
As every year, TecnATox was present in several events of Nit de la Recerca 2022. In the first of them, Dr. Montse Marquès gave a talk at INS Joan Guinjoan (Riudoms), entitled Endocrine disruptors: the chemical cocktail of our everyday life.
An important delegation of TecnaTox researchers, including Jordina Balaguer, Saurav Kumar, Òscar Sabuz, as well as Dr. Deepika, attended the XVIth International Congress of Toxicology, which was held in the city of Maastricht, the Netherlands, from September 18 to 21, 2022. These researchers presented a number of posters focused on the following areas:
1) Artificial intelligence for predicting BBB permeation
2) In-vitro gut-brain axis along with microbiota for Neurotoxicity
3) In-vitro gut-immune axis along with microbiota for Immunotoxicity
4) Development of PBPK model for organophosphate flame retardant for Neurotoxicity in infants
A PDF copy of the posers presented in the conference can be download here.
The 34th Annual Conference of the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology / ISEE 2022 took place in September 18-21, 2022, in Athens (Greece). TecnATox was represented by Dr. Montse Marquès, who presented a communication entitled Endocrine disruptors and gestational diabetes mellitus: A pilot study of INSULIN cohort (Catalonia, Spain).
In 2021, Prof. Domingo performed a review of the scientific literature on the origin of SARS-CoV-2 in Environmental Research. One year after, because of the important advances on the knowledge of this virus, he has published an updated review in Environmental Research.
According to the results of the review, the origin of SARS-CoV-2 cannot be not established yet, although most papers point out to a zoonotic origin of this coronavirus. In any case, the hypothesis of an unnatural origin of SARS-CoV-2 cannot be yet scientifically discarded. Imoprtantly, most of the available papers on the origin of SARC-CoV-2 are not experimental studies.
Bibliographic details on this publication can be found below:
Experts from all over Europe in research in the fields of toxicology and the environment have gathered in Tarragona to work together within the framework of the European Partnership for the Assessment of Risks from Chemicals (PARC) project, which aims to study the impact that the chemicals present in our environment have on people’s health and to urge governments to improve their regulation.
Chemistry is present in our everyday life (in food, packaging, electronics, clothes…) and also in the air we breathe. It is essential, but so is ensuring that these products are safe for our health and the environment. The TecnATox research group of the Institut d’Investigació Sanitària Pere Virgili (IISPV-CERCA) and the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) has been conducting research in the field of toxicology and the environment for more than 3 decades and it is a reference in Spain.
The European Partnership for the Assessment of Risks from Chemicals (PARC) project is coordinated by the Agence Nationale de Sécurité Sanitaire (ANSES) and nearly 200 key institutions work together in the field of research throughout Europe. In Spain, the Pere Virgili Health Research Institute, which participates in the study as an affiliated entity of the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII), is the one that has received the most funds from the European Commission (organization responsible for financing).
PARC is part of the Horizon Europe program, which aims to achieve a scientific, technological, economic and social impact of the European Union’s investments in the field of R&D.
Every year, Alzheimer’s World Day takes place on September 21. As this is one of the research areas of TecnATox, several investigators will attend an event at the School of Medicine and Health Sciences, co-organized by URV, IISPV, St. Joan University Hospital, the Alzheimer's Association of Reus and Baix Camp, the Family Association of Alzheimer Costa Daurada, and the Catalan Society of Biology, territorial section of Southern Catalonia. Dr. Mònica Bulló will be one of the invited speakers, while Dr. Jaume Folch will be the moderator of the round table.
