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PCB presents Xplore Health, the first European portal to enable the school community to access to biomedical research

By 4 de July de 2011November 18th, 2020No Comments
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 04.07.2011

PCB presents Xplore Health, the first European portal to enable the school community to access to biomedical research

Today, at 12.00 hours, at the Antoni Caparros Auditorium, the Barcelona Science Park presented Xplore Health, the first European portal aimed at the secondary school community to bring current biomedical research to teaching in classrooms and museums across Europe.


The act was attended by the rector of the University of Barcelona, Didac Ramirez, general director of the Barcelona Science Park, Fernando Albericio, the director of the Department of Science, Research and Environment of the Fundación “la Caixa”, Enric Banda , the CEO of Amgen Spain, Jordi Martí and technical director of the Dissemination of Science of the Barcelona Science Park, Rosina Malagrida, also coordinator of Health Xplore.

The event was also attended by Jordi Quintana, head of the Drug Discovery Platform of the PCB, and Luis Ruiz, director of Janus Development- members of the Scientific Committee of the project- who explained to the audience the stages of drug development and the multiple applications that biotechnology brings to today´s society.

Throughout the presentation an “in situ” experiment will be carried out to synthesize a drug that the PCB is currently working on and which could be useful in the fight against Parkinson’s disease.

Health Xplore was born with the wish to expand the dissemination initiatives offered by the Barcelona Science Park within the framework of its Research in Society Programme, which includes 120 events every year aimed at approximately 6,000 young people. The portal is funded by the European Commission, through the 7th Framework Programme, and also has the support of the Obra Social “la Caixa” Foundation and Amgen.

The project is developed by a European consortium coordinated by the Barcelona Science Park, and also includes the Centre of the Cell, located within the University of London, as well as two European networks that coordinate classroom activities: the European School Net, which includes more than 30,000 schools in over 30 countries and the European Network of Science Centres and Museums (ECSITE), which includes more than 400 science museums.

Xplore Health is an opportunity window into current biomedical research for students from different countries to get closer and play a participative role in the “day to day” activities of laboratories. The portal offers different formats, such as virtual experiments, where students can conduct online-current experiments, entertainment and video games now contextualized within current scientific developments. At the same time, the portal also provides educators with experiemnt protocols that will enable museums across Europe to recreate research projects.These tools invite their audiences to carry out experiments, such as the synthesis of a drug against Parkinson´s disease that is currently under research at the Barcelona Science Park, or a bacterial transformation project that is also being researched at the University of Barcelona within the framework of a project against atherosclerosis.

Xplore Health is also committed to train citizens in the ethical, legal and socioeconomic issues that revolve around research. To thie end, the portal also provides tools to promote social debate around these issues. Among other initiatives, card games are provided so that schools and museums can discuss these issues with strong arguments and, at the same time, participants can express their conclusions through a blog.

Currently, the portal offers a thematic module on “How to develop drugs,” and during the month of July a second module on “biotechnology revolution” will be released. Subsequently, other modules will be published on different areas such as genomics, malaria, AIDS, obesity or mental health, among others.