Europe, 7 September 2020.- Hundreds of innovators, research pioneers, clinicians, industry leaders and policy makers from all around Europe are united by a vision of how to revolutionize healthcare. In two publications – a perspective article in the journal Nature and the LifeTime Strategic Research Agenda – they now present a detailed roadmap of how to leverage the latest scientific breakthroughs and technologies over the next decade, to track, understand and treat human cells throughout an individual’s lifetime.

The LifeTime initiative, including the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) and the Centro Nacional de Análisis Genómico (CNAG-CRG), based in Barcelona, has developed a strategy to advance personalised treatment for five major disease classes: cancer, neurological-, infectious-, chronic inflammatory- and cardiovascular diseases. The aim is a new age of personalised, cell-based interceptive medicine for Europe with the potential of improved health outcomes and more cost-effective treatment, resulting in profoundly changing a person’s healthcare experience.

Earlier detection and more effective treatment of diseases

To form a functioning, healthy body, our cells follow developmental paths during which they acquire specific roles in tissues and organs. But when they deviate from their healthy course, they accumulate changes leading to disease which remain undetected until symptoms appear. At this point, medical treatment is often invasive, expensive and inefficient. However, now we have the technologies to capture the molecular makeup of individual cells and to detect the emergence of disease or therapy resistance much earlier. Using breakthrough single-cell and imaging technologies in combination with artificial intelligence and personalized disease models will allow us to not only predict disease onset earlier, but also to select the most effective therapies for individual patients. Targeting disease-causing cells to intercept disorders before irreparable damage occurs will substantially improve the outlook for many patients and has the potential of saving billions of Euros of disease-related costs in Europe.

A detailed roadmap for implementing LifeTime

The perspective article “LifeTime and improving European healthcare through cell-based interceptive medicine” and the LifeTime Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) explain how these technologies should be rapidly co-developed, transitioned into clinical settings and applied to the five major disease areas. Close interactions between European infrastructures, research institutions, hospitals and industry will be essential to generate, share and analyse LifeTime’s big medical data across European borders. The initiative’s vision advocates ethically responsible research to benefit citizens all across Europe.

According to Professor Nikolaus Rajewsky, scientific director of the Berlin Institute for Medical System Biology at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine and coordinator of the LifeTime Initiative, the LifeTime approach is the way into the future: "LifeTime has brought together scientists across fields – from biologists, to clinicians, data scientists, engineers, mathematicians, and physicists – to enable a much-improved understanding of molecular mechanisms driving health and disease. Cell-based medicine will allow doctors to diagnose diseases earlier and intercept disorders before irreparable damage has occurred. LifeTime has a unique value proposition that promises to improve the European patient’s health."

Dr. Geneviève Almouzni, Director of research at CNRS, honorary director of the research centre from Institut Curie in Paris and co-coordinator of the LifeTime Initiative believes that the future with LifeTime offers major social and economic impact: "By implementing interceptive, cell-based medicine we will be able to considerably improve treatment across many diseases. Patients all over the world will be able to lead longer, healthier lives. The economic impact could be tremendous with billions of Euros saved from productivity gains simply for cancer, and significantly shortened ICU stays for Covid-19. We hope EU leaders will realize we have to invest in the necessary research now."

 

Marc A. Marti-Renom, ICREA Research Professor, group leader at the CNAG-CRG and the CRG, and author of the perspective article published, says “LifeTime is the largest effort in EU to bring together complementary disciplines to develop and apply new technologies that can monitor and treat complex diseases over time. There is a momentum that cannot be missed by the EU to organize a strong long-term medical research program.”

 

Michela Bertero, Head of the International & Scientific Affairs Office at the CRG, and also author of the article, believes “The interdisciplinary approach of LifeTime comes along with a centric-patient vision. Our institute is excited to collaborate with LifeTime in promoting an open dialogue with society and tackling fundamental societal and ethical issues that new technologies often pose”.

Works of reference:

1. LifeTime and improving European healthcare through cell-based interceptive medicine

2. LifeTime Strategic Research Agenda

3. Thinking ‘ethical’ when designing a new biomedical research consortium