Our team contributed with an invited presentation, oral communication and poster presentation by Francesc Villarroya, Albert Blasco-Roset and Albert Mestres-Arenas in relation to the identification of novel batokines involved in the control of adiposity and metabolism. Fruitful interactions with the Spanish community involved in basic and clinical research on obesity has been developed.
Devoted to interdisciplinary research on the role of adipose tissue in health and disease. The ADIPOBROAD network has been awarded by the Ministry of Science to coordinate research on adipobiology and undertake innovative research on emerging issues such as the importance of gender in adipose tissue, climate change and adiposity, or the key role of adipose tissue in cancer and aging. Ten research teams across Spain, placed at Cordoba, Santiago de Compostela, Pamplona, Tarragona, Girona, Madrid, Valencia and Barcelona will act as members of the network.
Pablo Fernández from Rey Juan Carlos University, Madrid; and Laura Fei, from University of Florence, Italy, completed fruitful research stays at our lab on distinct projects on adipocyte pathophysiology. Our lab is happy to host young promising researchers and we appreciate their input and enthusiasm.
Under the moto "Science is catchy", the University of Barcelona reports a
dialogue between Professor Marta Giralt and her daughter, doctoral student Palmira Llorens. On the occasion of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, the University of Barcelona released an interview about these issues with two women who live and share research in their closest environment: at home. They are Marta Giralt, from our research team, and her daughter Palmira Llorens, a PhD student in genetics at the UB.
For full information click here.
The Spanish Society of Obesity (SEEDO) organized the “The Day of Obesity” in Spain last
December 15. A highlight was dissemination of the importance of research on brown adipose
tissue activity, why it is protective for obesity and associated diseases, and how current
research envisage the identification of new tools for therapeutic activation of brown fat.
Ruben Cereijo and Marta Giralt from our research team organized an open session to public
volunteers for non-invasive assessment of brown fat activity using infrared thermography as
well as dissemination of the importance of brown fat in the premises of the Faculty of Biology in the University of Barcelona.
Francesc Villarroya acted as spokesman in a press conference in Madrid organized by SEEDO to highlight the current status and importance of brown adipose tissue research. The “Day of
Obesity” activities by SEEDO have had this year an outstanding coverage in the Spanish media, highlighting the importance of research to achieve successful therapeutic and preventive actions on obesity and the promising research involving brown fat.
Our research team is proud to participate in the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the first academic year in the Historical Building of the University of Barcelona. A concert by the UB orchestra, in which our team member Dr. Joan Villarroya participates as a violinist, performing concert pieces by Catalan composers, kicks off the commemorative activities.
Increased adiposity is a current concern in people living with HIV treated with the last-generation antiretroviral drugs of the integrase inhibitor family. The platform NAM-AIDSMAP, devoted to provision of independent, accurate & accessible information about HIV, highlights our findings recently published in Life Sciences (doi: 10.1016/j.lfs.2022.120948). We showed that the integrase inhibitor dolutegravir suppresses the production of adiponectin, a chemical secreted by fat tissue that regulates insulin sensitivity, which provides further evidence that dolutegravir can have direct effects on the human cells that store fat (see https://www.aidsmap.com/news/oct-2022/dolutegravir-has-direct-effects-fat-cells).
Francesc Villarroya, as invited speaker, Tania Quesada, through a selected communication, and Moisès Castellà through a poster communication, presented our current research on inter-organ singaling and molecular actors involved in metabolism and adipose tissue thermogenic plasticity at the EMBO meeting held in Málaga last 3 to 6 October.
The "2nd symposium of research Institutes at University of Barcelona was devoted to interdisciplinary research on climate change and global warming. In this context, as a contribution from IBUB, Marta Giralt presented the current knowledge and research perpectives on the cross-talk between climate change events and obesity pandemics, and how worldwide altered adiposity is both a consequence and a potential actor in climate change and global warming.
Journal of Endocrinology is the flagship basic science journal of the Society for Endocrinology, and is also an official journal of the European Society of Endocrinology and the Endocrine Society of Australia. See journal's news at https://joe.bioscientifica.com/page/impactfactor/impact-factor-collection.
