PathoGenoMics

The ERA-NET PathoGenoMics is a project for cooperation and coordination of genome sequencing and functional genomics of human-pathogenic microorganisms. Pathogenomics started in 2004 and ran until 2011. The budget in the EU Sixth Framework Programme was EUR 3 million, of which the Academy of Finland accounted for EUR 270,000. The project comprised research funding agencies from ten countries:

  • Austria: Federal Ministry for Education, Science and Culture
  • Finland: Academy of Finland  
  • France: Ministry of Research, Department for Bio-Engineering 
  • Germany: Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, coordinator, and Federal Ministry of Education and Research
  • Hungary: National Office of Research and Technology
  • Israel: Ministry of Health
  • Latvia: Latvian Council of Science
  • Portugal: Portuguese National Science Foundation
  • Slovenia: Ministry of Education, Science and Sport
  • Spain: Ministry of Education and Science

In addition, the following associate partners from seven other countries participated in the project: Netherlands Genomics Initiative from the Netherlands; Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council from the UK; Austrian Science Fund from Austria; Ministry of Education and Science from Lithuania; Malta Council for Science and Technology from Malta; Research Council of Norway from Norway; and Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research from Sweden.

The research fields within PathoGenoMics are genomics (e.g. structural and functional genomics, proteomics, bioinformatics), human pathogenesis-related microbes (bacteria, fungi) and the molecular-biological background of infections (e.g. virulence factors and interaction between man and microbes).

PathoGenoMics works for the initiating of a pan-European research programme. The aim is through national research programmes or parts of programmes to step up cooperation and funding practices among funding agencies, to create an internal market for pathogenomics by fostering the mobility of researchers and movement of knowledge, techniques and resources, as well as to establish research and researcher training programmes in Europe.

First, the project will compile information on research programmes in the field both in Europe and elsewhere, and the views of policy-makers and leading researchers on key societal problems and focus areas of research in terms of pathogenic microbe genome research in the future. This will help create the content of a European research programme in microbe genome research. The project will establish joint administrative and organisational practices for joint-funded calls. At the first stage, calls (two rounds at one-year interval) are scheduled to be bi- or trilateral, at a later stage multilateral.  In the framework of these calls, only international research consortia will be funded. Workshops will be organised in order to support researchers in their efforts to prepare for the calls. The aim is also to establish a European researcher training programme for young researchers and to disseminate popularised information on pathogenic microbes and related diseases to the general public.

The Academy of Finland has participated in the project through the Microbes and Man (MICMAN) research programme.

Last changed 02/02/2012