Joana Almeida Awarded Best Poster Presentation at ECI Conference on Advancing Manufacture of Cell and Gene Therapy

Joana Almeida, PhD student at iBET’s Stem Cell Bioprocessing Lab, in collaboration with Organ Bioengineering and Regenerative Medicine Lab, IIS-Aragón, was awarded the Best Poster Presentation at the ECI conference on Advancing Manufacture of Cell and Gene Therapies VII.

Her work entitled “A nature-inspired protocol to generate mature hiPSC-derived hepatocytes: unveiling the role of human intestinal microbiome” describes an integrated bioprocess for the manufacturing of hiPSC-derived hepatocytes (hiPSC-Hep) in perfusion stirred-tank bioreactors. This work explores the use of the secretome from human intestinal bacteria as a biotechnological tool to mature hiPSC-Hep in vitro, recapitulating critical events of liver development in the early postnatal period.

The ECI Advancing Manufacture of Cell and Gene Therapies VII Conference was held in Coronado, California (CA), from February 6-10 2022, and gathered leading international specialists from academia and industry to showcase and debate the latest breakthroughs in advancing the engineering and manufacturing of next-generation therapies.

Read more here about iBET's R&D activities in cell therapy.