GCB Symposium 2018

Dear Participants
Dear Guests
It is our great pleasure to welcome you to the GCB Symposium 2018 at the University of Bern. As the Graduate School for Cellular and Biomedical Sciences (GCB) progresses into the second decade of its existence, we are proud to look back on yet another year of successful growth.
Our traditional annual meeting is aimed at bringing together all PhD candidates currently enrolled in the GCB, together with their supervisors, co-advisors, and mentors. The symposium offers a showcase for the broad spectrum of research going on within the interdisciplinary GCB, encompassing areas of the molecular life sciences, biomedical sciences, epidemiology, and biomedical engineering, and thus promotes extensive scientific exchange and networking among participants. As the largest and oldest Graduate School at the University of Bern, the GCB involves the participation of three faculties—the Faculty of Medicine, the Faculty of Science, and the Vetsuisse Faculties Bern and Zurich, as well as a selection of affiliated institutions, including the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB) in Bellinzona, the AO Research Institute in Davos, the Biotechnology Institute Thurgau (BITg) in Kreuzlingen, the RMS Foundation in Bettlach, and the Swiss Paraplegic Centre in Nottwil.
The symposium starts with five parallel sessions of two sets of short talks—40 talks altogether. For the first time, each session is followed by 15 minutes of «Poster Flash» presentations. In the subsequent two poster sessions, a total of 182 posters are on display, which can also be viewed during coffee and lunch breaks. Taking up on the last two years success, the day concludes with the «GCB Slam», in which 10 PhD candidates compete for the best concise, 4-min overview over their research projects, involving the active participation of members of the audience. In each of these presentation formats, the PhD candidates are challenged to give evidence of their outstanding level of competence in their research field, and of their deep commitment to science.
Two highlights in the afternoon must be singled out: Firstly, the annual «GCB Award for Best PhD Thesis» will be conferred on one of our most outstanding graduates of the year 2017. Secondly, we welcome Prof. Dr. Martin Schwab, Brain Research Institute, University of Zurich, and Dept. of Health Sciences and Technology, ETH Zurich, for the Keynote Lecture on «Neurobiological Mechanisms of Functional Recovery After Spinal Cord Injury or Stroke; the Long Way from the Lab Bench to the Clinic with a Neurite Growth Enhancing Therapy», to which we are looking forward with much anticipation.
On this special occasion, it is appropriate indeed to express our sincere thanks and appreciation to the GCB President and all members of the GCB Committees, for their dedication and commitment to the GCB.
The GCB enjoys the continuous support of the Executive Board of the University of Bern and the Deans of the three involved faculties, as well as the generous hospitality of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and the Department of Physiology for the GCB Symposia.
Furthermore, we address our warmest thanks to Prof. Dr. Britta Engelhardt and the team of the Theodor Kocher Institute, for offering the GCB, since its beginnings in 2005, a perfect home in dedicated rooms of the institute, and for hosting the GCB committees and PhD candidates on many occasions, for numerous activities.
We are convinced that the program of the GCB Symposium 2018 will once again meet your high expectations, and perhaps entice you to look at, listen to, and discuss topics further away from your own familiar research area. We are very much looking forward to sharing an exciting and stimulating day with you—and we invite you to join us in the concluding Apéro to celebrate another successful year of the GCB.

For the Organization Team:
PD Dr. Marlene Wolf, Gabrielle Favre