10th SCANDINAVIAN SOCIETY FOR BIOMATERIALS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE MARCH 2017

Department of Biomaterials, UiO and Deparment of Physics, NTNU was involved in organising this year's Scandinavian Society of Biomaterials meeting in Hafjell that focussed on the underlying challenges in biomaterials research. With the combination of an exotic and atmospheric location up in the Norwegian mountains and promise of good skiing conditions, we were not only able to attract some of the leading scientists in the field of biomaterials and tissue engineering as invited speakers but also enthusiastic biomaterials scientists from all corners of the world with people flying from as far as Singapore just to join our conference. In addition to the very inspiring keynote talks by the topnotch international invited speaker, the scientific programme that was put together by Håvard Haugen, Hanna Tiainen, and our colleagues Pawel Sikorski and David Basset from NTNU also included excellent contributed talks from biomaterials researchers from all across Europe, two of which were given by PhD students from our lab David Wiedmer and Manuel Schweikle. With two oral presentations, one rapid fire presentation, and four posters, we took our opportunity to showcase our research to our Nordic peers and our lab was in fact the most represented group in Hafjell. Many scientific discussions were had during the long coffee breaks, in the outdoor swimming pool, in the overcrowded sauna, and especially during the poster sessions, making all the effort our department has put into arranging this fantastic event all the more worthwhile.

The Scandinavian Society for Biomaterials (ScSB) was founded in 2008 and the organization is still young and under rapid development. In addition to provide intra-Nordic travel grants for PhD candidates and exceptional master students, the main focus of our activities has been centred on organizing an annual biomaterials meeting in Scandinavia. These conferences have been promoting cross-fertilization of biomaterials research in Scandinavia, in particular research related to biomaterial research. The 2017 conference will be hosted by Department of Biomaterials, University of Oslo on March 15th -17th at Ilsetra Hafjell, which ensures an enclosed and intense atmosphere for participants. This is a milestone for the network; to host the annual conference with collaboration and at one of the forefront biomaterials research groups in the Nordic countries. Scandinavian Society for Biomaterials (SCSB) hosts the event, but has appointed Professor Håvard J Haugen, head of the Department of Biomaterials at the University of Oslo, to arrange the event together with an organizing committee. The SCSB has a broad network and communication platform and together with professor Lyngstadaas? network it will ensure skilful and enthusiastic participants. The organizing committee will have two members from UiO (Dr. Hanna Tiainen and Prof. Håvard Haugen) and two from NTNU (Prof. Pawel Sikorski and Dr. David Bassett) with support from Prof. Molly Stevens, Imperial College/KTH Stockholm. Two out of the five members are young scientist. The core of this event is to match the fore front scientist within advanced new biomaterials together with students, young scientists, clinicians and end-users of biomaterials, namely the patients. A potential funding from the Norwegian Research Council would allow the network to portrait the program ambitions and provide the network to further converge with the biomaterial field.