The recent period, from October 1st, 2024, to September 30th, 2025, saw significant project activity, with several collaborative events taking place as planned by the partners.
The consortium continued to build upon its activities, fostering increased scientific interaction and training. The effective collaborations among VitaCross partners, and their contributions within their scientific fields, were evident through the participation and prominent presentations by all four partners (see examples below).
• VitaCross/INTPART training workshop “Recent advances in cofactor biology and mass spectrometry technologies for cofactors’ detection and quantification” -
December 9th to 13th 2024, Mobile, AL, USA: Hybrid (in person/online).
o 17 invited speakers, 34 attendees in total. Hands-on training for trainees in LC-MS technologies
o Invited lectures by Barbara Bakker (Groningen): “NAD and one-carbon metabolism: a link between glycogen storage disease and hepatocellular carcinoma?”, Ines Heiland (Tromsø): “Stable isotope labelling based
fluxomics – What is possible and what needs to be considered?”, Mathias Ziegler (Bergen): “Interconnectivity of cellular NAD pools”, and Marie Migaud (Mobile): “If a cell could choose which cofactor to replenish first, would it be
NAD or FAD?”.
• FEBS Advanced Course “PARP2025” - May 11th to 15th 2025, Illkirch, France.
o 20 invited speakers, >70 PhD students/postdocs, 102 participants in total.
o Mathias Ziegler (Bergen) gave an invited lecture: “Hungry for NAD? How human cells maintain their NAD pools”.
• Lorentz Center Workshop “Connected by Coenzyme A” - June 22nd to 26th 2025, Leiden, Netherlands.
o Barbara Bakker (Groningen) gave an invited lecture: “Combination of computational modelling and wet experiments to understand CoA-linked metabolic diseases”.
o Mathias Ziegler (Bergen) gave an invited lecture: “Lessons from NAD, the HubMol sister of CoA”.
• Austrian Proteomics and Metabolomics Association Conference - September 12th to 13th 2025, Vienna, Austria.
o 120 participants (>50 PhD and master students).
o Ines Heiland (Tromsø) delivered a Keynote lecture: “Cofactors and protein modifications – dynamics and interdependencies”.
• HubMol MSCA doctoral network training event - September 28th to October 2nd 2025, Tromsø, Norway.
o All partners of VitaCross were present and held lectures, three are PIs in the network, Ines Heiland is coordinator. 14 lecturers, 15 PhD students.
In addition, bilateral staff exchanges took place between the European partners (Tromsø, Groningen, Bergen). The schedule for the activities during the remaining project period has been agreed. A final VitaCross Symposium is planned for Spring 2026.
Systems medicine has emerged as essential discipline to identify disease mechanisms and biomarkers, follow and predict the effect of treatments and to develop new, combinatorial therapies. To our knowledge, dedicated study programs in systems medicine do net yet exist in Norway. This project will bring together a team of leading experts from four renowned academic institutions [in Norway (2), the United States (1) and the Netherlands (1)]. They will develop a unique portfolio of systems medicine training – from molecular mechanisms to disease treatment. The courses will include experimental and computational analyses of metabolic pathways and signaling networks, chemical biology of cancer, advanced analytical techniques, mathematical modelling and machine learning as well as principles of drug development. Based on well-established scientific collaborations with all partners, UiB will coordinate the project. Practical courses will be conducted in the relevant partner institutions. The EU consortium on systems medicine of breast cancer (MESI-STRAT) and the NeuroSysMed center (FKB, Bergen) will support this initiative with their competences.
This INTPART project will also significantly contribute to the scientific excellence of existing joint research projects among all parners. A major focus will be on the biology and medical significance of coenzymes derived from vitamin B precursors, a hot area of current biomedical research both in metabolomics, signaling and for the development of nutritional therapeutic concepts.
Collectively, the project will enable tight collaborations with outstanding academic environments in systems medicine, beyond existing EU initiatives, to develop world-class training in systems medicine. Moreover, it will provide the opportunity for outstanding research that no partner institution on its own would be able to conduct. Thereby, the new generation of scientists in biomedical research will be adequately prepared for the challenges ahead.
