Scientific summit brought leading antibiotic researchers to Uppsala

Wednesday 15 May, more than 200 representatives of academia, industry and patient organisations are teaming up at Uppsala University as research consortia ERA4TB and UNITE4TB invite to their first joint symposium. The meeting is hosted by Professor Ulrika Simonsson, whose research group in pharmacokinetics is the only one selected for participation in both consortia.

“In 2020, IMI initiated ERA4TB with the goal to develop new antibiotic candidates for the treatment of tuberculosis. The following year saw the launch of multimillion initiative UNITE4TB, which, operating on four continents, designs clinical phase 2 studies to accelerate the development of new drugs and dosage recommendations. The fact that we are today meeting in Uppsala adds unique opportunities for knowledge exchange and to lay the foundation for further collaborations along the entire chain of drug development, and the response is positive, to say the very least,” states Ulrika Simonsson.

The symposium's scientific agenda reflects the broad expertise on site with lectures by both leading and junior researchers. The opening session offered presentations by Christoph Lange, Professor at Research Center Borstel, and Mairi McClean, PhD student at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, on the ongoing efforts to quantify difficult-to-treat bacteria in lung tissue using biomarkers. Stewart Cole from Institut Pasteur gave an up to date overview on the work in ERA4TB and Albin Leding, PhD student at Uppsala University, reported on the progress at OPTIKA, the new in vitro kinetic platform for screening promising drug combinations.

“ERA4TB and UNITE4TB unite the absolute frontlines of academic and industrial research. The fact that IMI has also set aside funding for PhD Students confirms the long-term perspective of our work. This gives our group – being involved in both consortia – insight and room to engage in work along the entire spectrum from basic research to clinical studies. And despite the fact that the WHO today ranks tuberculosis as one of the biggest threats to global public health, I feel optimistic about the future,” says Ulrika Simonsson.

Already in the summer of 2023, Ulrika Simonsson's team welcomed representatives for research and care in the Baltic Sea countries to Campus Gotland and the conference Tuberculosis in the Baltic Sea Region. A meeting that provided important energy to existing collaborations as well as opportunities to identify common areas of interest and that will shortly be followed by a new conference in Lithuania. The hope is that Uppsala University also with the ongoing symposium will lay the foundation for a recurring success factor in ERA4TB and UNITE4TB's future work.

“We are facing a situation that requires full mobilisation of all available competencies, and the interest in both last year's conference and today's forum confirms that this is a challenge taken very seriously. The symposium is characterised by vivid talks with mutual understanding of the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration, and the feeling right now is that both consortia are positive about future joint arenas.

Text & photo: Magnus Alsne