A new centre of excellence for biomedical research will help develop new treatments to combat serious neurodegenerative diseases.
New laboratories at the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine provide boost for biomedical research
- 05 May 2014
The LCSB building offers, for experimental researchers, a good compromise between open laboratory space and smaller rooms where specific technologies and methodologies can be isolated from the open space. The open laboratory space combined with a glass wall separation between the laboratory space and the office space greatly enhances communication between the researchers on each floor.
The Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB), which opened in 2012, has been built on a brown field site at Belval and is the result of a strategic partnership between a number of American research institutes, the government of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the University of Luxembourg.
The new research centre aims to become a worldwide centre of expertise in molecular medicine and systems biology. The project also involves a significant technological component as the centre will also be involved in research in the field of bioinformatics, among other areas.
The activities carried out by the LCSB include high level scientific and applied research, specialist training at doctoral and post-doctoral level, international-level documentation and scientific publishing, and the supervision of master's dissertations and doctoral theses.
Developing new diagnostic tools
The centre will provide research biologists, medical doctors, computer scientists, physicists and mathematicians with a state-of-the-art facility in which to investigate complex systems like cells, organs and organisms. It is hoped that the centre’s research work will help to unravel the complex mechanisms of disease pathogenesis and will help to develop new diagnostic and therapeutic tools.
Neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s disease, metabolomics and disease network analysis are a particular focus of the centre’s research. Within Luxembourg the LCSB is building up strong partnerships with all major biological and medical research units. The centre fosters collaboration with industrial partners and will be a focal point for developing a knowledge-based economy in Luxembourg.
The new facility covers a total surface area of 3 300 m2 spread over six floors. Fifty-five new jobs have been created as a result of the project, of which 37 are research positions.
Total investment and EU funding
Total investment for the project "Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine" is EUR 5 850 774, of which the EU’s European Regional Development Fund is contributing EUR 2 047 771 from the Operational Programme "Luxembourg" for the 2007 to 2013 programming period.