Portal de Murcia
www.portaldemurcia.com
The extraordinary professor of Developmental Biology at the Catholic University of Murcia and director of the Gene Expression Laboratory of the Salk Institute gave a lecture on organ regeneration and aging this morning in Madrid
Dr. Juan Carlos Izpisua has caused admiration this morning in his speech at the Breakfast COE-UCAM, held at the Meliá Castilla Hotel in Madrid, where he has released the results of his latest research, with which he intends to rewrite the genome human to cure, for example, Down syndrome in the fetus, or correct the epigenome to treat rare diseases (there are cataloged some 7,000 and many of them are devastating) or those that appear with aging.
"It is not about looking for how to be immortal, but that the last years of our lives are much healthier," said Izpisua, director of the Gene Expression Laboratory of the Salk Institute and Extraordinary Professor of Developmental Biology at the UCAM.
Have attended the event specialists in sports medicine, responsible for national sports federations, journalists, researchers, public officials, directors of the Spanish Olympic Committee and representatives of the Catholic University of Murcia.
Alejando Blanco, president of the COE and José Luis Mendoza, president of the UCAM, presented the speaker who, after explaining his latest advances, refused to create expectations about when it will be possible to heal in humans these diseases, hitherto incurable, thanks to these techniques, and that it is research that will only give long-term results and for which important economic resources are required for research, ensuring that "the UCAM is an exceptional case, that a private university allocates a significant part of its resources to research, in a disinterested way ".
Given the profile of the attendees, Juan Carlos Ipzisua put special emphasis on emphasizing that thanks to these techniques is intended to cure musculoskeletal diseases, such as muscular dystrophy, or deal with injuries or physiological processes, both elite athletes and people in general.
He said that an injured muscle recovers well at young ages, although it leaves marks;
regular in adult ages and bad or nothing in advanced ages.
His studies are aimed at getting him to heal in less time, without leaving marks and recovering all his abilities.
However he warned of the risk that the latest advances that science is making in this field may be misused in the future by some professional sportsmen to dope.
In this sense he warned that genetic doping, if it occurs, it will be possible to detect it, since it would leave marks, while at least for now it does not seem possible that it could detect the epigenetic doping, being necessary that science advance as soon as possible to identify it and prevent it from occurring.
In this regard, the president of the Spanish Olympic Committee, Alejandro Blanco, showed his admiration for the scientific advances led by Izpisua, and reiterated his commitment to fight against all types of doping, some of them so novel, and even possible future appearance , like the one that was just pointed.
The president of the Catholic University of Murcia showed his satisfaction not only because this university is achieving excellent quality results, with the renewal of all accreditations by the ANECA, but also by engaging in top-level research, contributing researchers and important own resources to promote world reference studies, such as those led by Dr. Izpisua, whose objective is the cure of diseases.
Juan Carlos Izpisua will be on Wednesday in the Jerónimos Monastery, since he will be in charge of reading the laudatio dedicated to Rafael Matesanz, creator of the National Organization of Transplants, winner of the Prince of Asturias Award for International Cooperation, who Doctor Honoris Causa will be invested by the UCAM.
Source: UCAM
Privacy policy
- Legal notice
- Cookies