News — Medical Faculty

Medical start-up project at the University of Bonn receives EXIST start-up grant¹

How can a customized chemotherapy be found for cancer, for example? Machine learning methods can help with this and also improve patient treatment for other diseases. The start-up project aimed analytics at the University of Bonn has developed a modular analysis system that precisely groups patients on the basis of medical Big Data. The team of Dr. Kevin Baßler, Dr. Patrick Günther and Karsten Waltemathe has now received a coveted EXIST start-up grant of 130,000 euros from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy for one year.

OERContent.nrw: Two Projects of the Faculty of Medicine receive Funding²

With the OERContent.nrw funding line, the state is funding a total of 18 collaborative projects for digital teaching and learning formats at universities with more than ten million euros. Fifty-eight project applications from universities in NRW applied for the funding. The successful applications, in which at least three universities collaborate on e-learning formats, will be funded with up to 1.5 million euros. E-learning formats can be online courses, learning videos or virtual labs, for example. The projects will start on April 1, 2022, and the universities will have a total of two years to complete the projects.

FEMHABIL: New Tender Round launched³

The Faculty of Medicine awards grants from faculty and state funds to highly qualified female physicians and scientists to complete their habilitation. The goal is to address the gender gap that still exists in postdoctoral degrees.

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Study by the University of Bonn: Self-learning software could help detect atherosclerosis at an early stage⁴

Researchers at the University and the University Hospital of Bonn have developed a method that could be used to diagnose atherosclerosis. Using self-learning software, they were able to identify vascular changes in patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD), often at an early stage. Although these early stages do not yet cause symptoms, they are nevertheless already associated with increased mortality. The algorithm used photos from an organ not normally associated with PAD: the eye. The results have now been published in the journal Scientific Reports.

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Researchers at the University of Bonn use artificial intelligence to detect rare diseases even more accurately⁵

Rare genetic diseases can sometimes be recognized through facial features, such as characteristically shaped brows, nose or cheeks. Researchers at the University of Bonn have now trained software that uses portrait photos to better diagnose such diseases. The improved version "GestaltMatcher" can now also detect diseases that are not yet known to it. It also manages to diagnose known diseases with very small numbers of patients. The study has now been published in the journal "Nature Genetics".

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Prof. Dr. Maximilian Billmann⁶

Prof. Dr. Maximilian Billmann has been appointed Professor of Pharmacogenomics at the Medical Faculty of the University of Bonn as of February 1, 2022.

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Structure of Central Inflammation Switch clarified⁷

Researchers at the Universities of Bonn and Regensburg have elucidated the structure of a key cellular inflammation switch. Their work shows the location of the giant protein called NLRP3 to which inhibitors can bind. This opens the way to new pharmaceuticals that could help against inflammatory diseases such as gout, type 2 diabetes or even Alzheimer's disease. The results have been published in the journal Nature.

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Prof. Dr. Rudi Balling appointed as Senior Professor⁸

Balling's research in the past has focused in particular on studying the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's. In Bonn, Balling will spend the next three years focusing on the questions of which mechanisms maintain homeostasis of the energetic and biological needs of immune, neuronal and other cell types in the wake of changing intrinsic or environmental conditions. In addition, he would like to investigate the consequences of dysregulation of anaplerotic responses for the pathogenesis of acute and chronic diseases, e.g. neurodegeneration, neuropsychiatric diseases, diabetes or cancer. The goal of his research will be to identify new approaches for preventive or therapeutic interventions. Among other things, he will do this by developing a computer-based "anaplerosis model" to help predict and identify anaplerosis-related drug targets.

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