Objective
Cell therapy can be defined as the transplantation of living cells for the treatment of medical disorders. Three different principles underlie the increasing interest in cell therapy. 1. Transplanted cells used as an “active drug” 2. Transplanted cells used to replace damaged and degenerated tissue. 3. Cells used as a drug delivery vehicle. Promising results have been obtained in pre-clinical and clinical studies, however, success rates have been variable and clinical benefits have been limited. A major issue is the fact that the mechanisms by which cell therapy works in the different disease areas, are still poorly understood. The ability to non-invasively monitor the fate and modes of action of transplanted cells over time is mandatory. The development of relevant imaging tools will lead to a better understanding of how cell therapy works, the possibility of response monitoring in patients, and sufficient safety of the treatment.. ENCITE will provide tools to allow this by developing; • New imaging methods to improve the spatio-temporal tracking of labelled cells • Dual- and multimodality imaging procedures to cross-validate each individual approach • New contrast agents and procedures that will improve the sensitivity and specificity of cellular labelling • Combining of molecular biology for the generation of molecular and cellular imaging reporters with multimodal imaging techniques • Novel cell and animal reporter systems detecting the location and function of individual cells and small cell subsets within the target organ • Cellular labelling that does not interfere with cellular functions and therapeutic efficacy • Methods for quantitative assessment to generate reliable biomarkers of the cell fate and therapeutic effects • Cell homing for therapeutic delivery to target organs The tools and methodologies developed will be validated in 5 key disease areas; Neurological, Cardiovascular, Musculoskeletal, Diabetes and Cancer.
Fields of science
Keywords
Call for proposal
FP7-HEALTH-2007-A
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Funding Scheme
CP-IP - Large-scale integrating projectCoordinator
1010 Wien
Austria
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Participants (29)
3015 GD Rotterdam
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WC2R 2LS London
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7610001 Rehovot
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80539 Munchen
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69978 Tel Aviv
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10124 Torino
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14021 Prague 4
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79106 Freiburg
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7000 Mons
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75270 cedex 06 Paris
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Participation ended
91054 Erlangen
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2333 ZA Leiden
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20126 MILANO
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6525 XZ Nijmegen
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31008 Pamplona
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75231 Paris
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95690 NESLES-LA-VALLEE
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50931 Koln
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28100 NOVARA
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31080 Pamplona
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91904 Jerusalem
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48149 MUENSTER
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3000 Leuven
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CB2 1TN Cambridge
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28006 Madrid
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08025 Barcelona
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1081 HV Amsterdam
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4031 Basel
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91054 Erlangen
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