Ponentes
PhD Javier Ramon-Azcón, (Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry), has a vast scientific track record in biomaterials fabrication, cell encapsulation, and 3D engineered tissues. In 2011, he was hired by the Advanced Institute for Materials Research (AIMR) at Tohoku University (Japan) as Assistant Researcher to develop new biomaterials with engineered tissue. After 2 years, he was promoted to Assistant Professor in AIMR, leading a research group focused on integrating biosensors technology with stem cell, biomaterials, and tissue engineering. In 2017, he became Junior Group Leader at the Institute of Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) after obtaining the prestigious ERC- Starting Grant. In 2020, he was appointed Professor by the Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA) and Senior Group Leader based on his successful and promising scientific trajectory. From 2017 and 2020, he has attracted more than €3.5M in competitive funding, including the coordination of a FET-Open project. Currently, he supervises 5 postdocs, 4 Ph.D. students, and 3 MSC students.
The group he leads, 'Biosensors for Bioengineering,' focuses on several lines of research with the common goal to integrate sensor technology and nanotechnology with tissue engineering. This integration of fully functional engineered tissues with microscale biosensor technology allows the obtention of organs-on-a-chip. The integrated biosensing technology monitors cellular responses to external stimuli, examining the quality of the microenvironment (e.g., metabolites, nutrients), and supporting diverse cellular requirements. These chips could be used in pharmaceutical assays and could be a step toward the ultimate goal of producing in vitro drug testing systems crucial to the medicine and pharmaceutical industry. The evolution of his research abilities, as shown by the number and quality of my scientific publications (75 documents with index h = 27 and 1783 citations) and communications at scientific conferences (a total of 40), demonstrate his capacity to significantly go beyond state of the art in the field of novel biosensors, tissue engineering and AI.
