EATRIS Norway: from bench to bed ? state of the art infrastructure and organization bridging the gap between basic and clinical research

EATRIS (The European Infrastructure for Translational Medicine) acts as a European-wide 'distributed research infrastructure' to help accelerate the development of new drug treatments and diagnostic tools. The infrastructure consists of 13 member countries and more than 90 academic research centres across Europe. The headquarters is located in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Norway has initially committed itself to EATRIS membership for 5 years (2016-2020). The Norwegian EATRIS node consists of the University of Oslo, University of Bergen, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, UiT The Arctic University of Norway and the four Regional Health Authorities in Southeastern, Western, Central and Northern Norway. EATRIS offers a unique one-stop shop access to the combined expertise and high-end technologies required to advance new products through the translational process from target validation to early clinical trials. The infrastructure is open to both academic researchers and companies in need of support for advancing biomedical innovations. EATRIS focuses on preclinical and early clinical development of drugs, vaccines and diagnostics and provide solutions in the fields of advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs), biomarkers, imaging and tracing, small molecules and vaccines. UiO is the host institution for EATRIS in Norway and the participation is coordinated by Centre for Molecular Medicine Norway (NCMM) as the national Center for Molecular Medicine and translational research. Since 2019 NCMM Director Janna Saarela is the national EATRIS director. An important element of the EATRIS coordination function is to ensure integration with the complementary life sciences infrastructures operating in Norway, including the ESFRI nodes of ECRIN, ELIXIR and EU-OPENSCREEN. Close cooperation is essential to ensure access to the specialized facilities and expertise residing therein, for better medicines development as well as to strengthen the Norwegian contribution to European collaborations in academic projects and initiatives, which also should increase competitiveness on European arenas. NCMM in the beginning of 2018 hired an EATRIS coordinator in Norway, Laetitia Abdou Garonne. The tasks of the coordinator include mobilizing Norwegian environments to participate in EATRIS, coordinating Norwegian participation and mobilizing Norwegian participants for project consortia who can apply for EU funds. This further strengthens national cooperation and participation from Norwegian research environments in EATRIS. Furthermore, the EATRIS Coordination and Support (C&S) Office in Amsterdam is collaborating closely with the coordinator here in Norway, and is thus better equipped to help researchers seeking support, to find relevant Norwegian partners in their proposals as well as supporting Norwegian applications with sourcing of other European partners. The EATRIS coordinator is also collaborating closely with the other Nordic EATRIS coordinators to discuss and plan Nordic interaction and joint activities. In October 2019, the first national EATRIS meeting took place at Gardermoen. The meeting was attended by researchers and administrative staff from various Norwegian institutions that are members of EATRIS Norway, representatives from the Research council of Norway and Helse Sør Øst as well as members of the EATRIS coordination and support (C&S) team based in Amsterdam.

Prosjektet ansatte en EATRIS koordinator. Dette var essensielt for å styrke både kommunikasjon og aktivitet i den norske noden. Flere eksperter og kjernefasiliteter ved alle partnerinstitusjonene i Norge har blitt innlemmet, og den norske noden har dermed blitt utvidet med ekspertise som nå er tilgjengelig også internasjonalt. Koordinatoren møtt både forskere og EU-rådgivere ved andre institusjoner. Flere nye EU/H2020 prosjekter er påbegynt, og flere potensielle prosjekter er i pipeline. Koordinator har også samarbeidet med de andre nordiske koordinatorene og hatt tett kontakt med hovedkontoret i Nederland. Koordinator har representert EATRIS Norge på en rekke internasjonale møter og har deltatt på nasjonale workshops og seminarer. Et årlig nasjonalt EATRIS nettverksmøte som møteplass for norske aktører er også etablert. Økt bevissthet om hva EATRIS tilbyr vil forhåpentligvis på sikt resultere i økt bruk av de ulike plattformene og i nye samarbeid som gir mer ekstern finansiering.

Translational medicine is the transformation of laboratory research outcomes into new ways to diagnose and treat patients to improve the health of millions of people worldwide. It takes promising biomedical innovations ?from bench to bedside? and bridges clinical needs from bedside to bench. EATRIS ERIC (European Infrastructure for Translational Medicine) was created out of the emerging recognition, in the early 2000s, that the process of translating biological insights of disease mechanisms into effective interventions is a complex and multidisciplinary undertaking, requiring significant dedicated expertise and infrastructure. EATRIS now provides a new development pathway, open to researchers and companies in need of support for advancing biomedical innovations. EATRIS comprises over 80 leading academic institutions across 12 European countries. From 2016 Norway formally entered EATRIS ERIC as a full member. The Norwegian participation in EATRIS is coordinated by Centre for Molecular Medicine Norway (NCMM) and NCMM is responsible for the administrative tasks of the national infrastructure. A very important element of the EATRIS coordination function is to ensure full integration with the complementary life sciences infrastructures operating in Norway, including the ESFRI nodes of ECRIN, ELIXIR and EU-OPENSCREEN. Close cooperation is essential, in order to ensure access to the specialized facilities and expertise residing therein, for better medicines development as well as to strengthen the Norwegian contribution to European collaborations in academic projects and initiatives. In this proposal we are therefore asking for funding for an EATRIS coordinator in Norway. Having a single coordination point to mobilize Norwegian resources to increase involvement in the European consortia is important both for EATRIS and for the research institutions involved in the Norwegian node.