Last Sunday I started my trip from the small hanseatic city Lübeck to the multicultural metropole city Paris.
The reason for this trip was to work together with one of our Leducq collaborators (CADgenomics) in the research group headed by Ewa Ninio.
This collaboration was initiated during our last Leduq meeting in San Diego (see previous post). There I met Zahia and discussed the possibility to visit the group, and work together on a project aiming to functionally analyse one mutation identified by the IIEG research group using exome sequencing in family members affected with myocardial infarction. The study includes migration/proliferation assay using smooth muscle cells (SMC) and endothelial cells (EC). The group is well established in this field.
Voila donc, I landed in Orly airport and took a cab to the centre of the city, very close to the very famous Park “Jardin des Plantes”, where I rented a very nice small apartment for one week. After registration, late in the evening, I just had a light dinner and went to bed.
The next day (Monday) I started my day with small sweet French breakfast and easily found the “Boulverad de l’hopitale”, where the institute is located: “French Institute of Health and Medical Research, Université Paris 6 Pierre Marie Curie”
The institute is located nearby the clinical Hospital of ” PITIÉ-SALPÊTRIÈRE” (http://www.aphp.fr/contenu/hopital-universitaire-pitie-salpetriere-0)
As it was my first time there, Zahia was waiting for me in front of the main entrance. She introduced me to her group and later I met David, who was just recently nominated as director of the institute. We know him since 2007; at that time he was a junior scientist involved in our EU-funded consortium Cardiogenics (https://www.cardiogenics.org/web/).
The institute has a beautiful view on Paris and you can even see the Eiffel tower from the offices and labs.
After a very short introduction to all members of the team, Zahia and I went directly to the Lab and started with the experiments. Overall, it was a nice week but very busy week with a lot of experimental work. Hopefully, the results will help us to further understand the pathogenesis of CAD in our family of interest.
On Friday, Ewa invited us for a working Lunch and we enjoyed French cuisine. During lunch Zahia and I reported what we have achieved and what we still want to accomplish.
After that lunch we went back to the lab and finished the rest of our work.
Finally, I took a very short sight-seeing tour.
It was a great pleasure to visit the group of Ewa and work together with Zahia.
Thanks again to Ewa and Zahia for the nice stay and helpful and interesting collaboration. Looking forward for continuous collaborations not only within our Leducq network.
ZA
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