NIH NCATS supports the first three Microphysiological Systems World Summits with grant

Posted on 2021-09-20

The initiative to create a series of MPS World Summits has been awarded a grant by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), one of 27 Institutes and Centers at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in support of the organization of the first three Microphysiological Systems World Summits.

About 40 organizations (and counting) as well as a continuously expanding Scientific Advisory Committee of experts in the field have teamed up to organize the May 30-June 3, 2022 inaugural World Summit in New Orleans and similar events in Europe 2023 and the US West Coast in 2024. The series was kicked-off with a virtual conference on June 24, 2021 with the theme "Towards regulatory acceptance", which will be followed by a second virtual event on December 9, 2021 on "Systems engineering of microphysiological systems".

The MPS (Microphysiological Systems) World Summit will bring together a global audience, including institutions (government, health foundations, charities), the academic research community (universities, research institutes), environmental and human toxicity researchers, the pharmaceutical and other industries (cosmetics, chemical, and food industries), medical centers and practitioners, patient associations, and policy makers and testing centers—in a series of global conferences to create a roadmap for MPS technologies. This will be a first step in establishing an international MPS society. 

The MPS World Summit offers multiple sponsoring opportunities as detailed on the website to which the companies listed below have already committed:

  • Gold sponsor: Emulate
  • Silver sponsors: AxoSim, Hesperos, InSphero, Obatala
  • Bronze sponsor: Nortis
  • Exhibitors: Aracari, Mimetas, Vitrocel Systems GmbH, TissUse

In related good news, the latest issue of Science features the article:

Roth, A. and MPS-WS Berlin 2019 [Marx, U., Vilén, L., Ewart, L., Griffith, L. G., Hartung, T., Ingber, D. E., Mendrick, D. L., Steger-Hartmann, T. and Tagle, D. A.]. Human microphysiological systems for drug development. Science 2021, 373:1304-1306. doi: 10.1126/science.abc3734

which was a direct result of the hightly cited t4 workshop report published in ALTEX:

Marx, U., Akabane, T., Andersson, T. B. et al. (2020). Biology-inspired microphysiological systems to advance patient benefit and animal welfare in drug development. ALTEX 37, 365-394. doi:10.14573/altex.2001241