Descritption

The applicant and SEE-DRUG beneficiary, University of Patras (UPAT), is one of Greece’s pre-eminent Education and Research Organizations (founded in 1964) and is characterized by highly-cited research activities in biological and chemical sciences and is considered the premier academic institution in Western Greece (has the largest number of educational/research personnel and students among all Universities of South-Western Greece). Over the last 10 years, UPAT has acted on its long-term vision of expansion and has recruited high quality researchers in modern fields of Life Sciences. These scientists have contributed to the transfer of knowledge from their previous, top-of-the-class, institutions to the UPAT departments, where they apply cutting-edge techniques in the fields of Structural or Chemical Biology and Pharmacology. However, UPAT’s further development is hampered by the lack of certain expensive, modern equipment. Lately, the available UPAT resources and especially the R&D Infrastructures seem increasingly inadequate to support the complete structural and functional characterization of protein drug targets and of lead compounds as potential drugs. Therefore, the integration of investigators from the main axes of structure-based design and evaluation of biological molecules is seriously impaired, and the “brain-gain” process of the last decade shows signs of turning into “brain-drain” in these areas of research and development. In essence, there are significant missing links in the chain: basic research  applied research  public health that could otherwise contribute to the regional scientific and economical growth. We firmly believe that this state of affairs is reversible, and that the SEE-DRUG project will be an important step in overturning this situation.

SEE-DRUG is a joint project from a number of groups working in various disciplines of basic and applied sciences: chemists, pharmacologists, biologists and bioinformaticians, affiliated to the Departments of Biology, Chemistry, Medicine and Pharmacy, supported also by the UPAT-affiliated distinct entity, the “Centre of Instrument-based Analysis”.

The SEE-DRUG strategy is essentially based on four core activities: Exchange of technological know-how and scientific expertise, Appointment of experienced, skilled researchers, Upgrading of the UPAT S&T Infrastructure and Organization of Workshops and Conferences.