Following the completion of the Human Genome Project in 2001, scientists and the media described the genome as “the book of life”, holding the answers to the way genes are linked to disease. Yet, seventeen years later, we are still deciphering how cells interpret this book.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since then, so-called Omics technologies have flourished, allowing researchers, for example, to observe and quantify thousands of gene products in a single tissue sample. Omics experiments used to require tens of thousands of cells. But in the last couple of years, novel single-cell methods have emerged which enable scientists to perform such global analyses in individual cells. The molecular make-up of tissues and organs can now be assessed at single-cell resolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mapping and analyzing tissues at the single-cell level is highly informative and challenging by itself, but a diverse group of 60 scientists across Europe decided that merely taking snapshots is not enough. Cells are highly dynamic entities and may even change identities. To understand molecular forces behind different cell states in development, aging and disease, these scientists want to track the molecular make-up of human cells in time and space. To this end, they formed the LifeTime consortium with the goal of establishing an integrated toolbox containing several novel revolutionary methods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Single-cell technologies will be applied to experimental model systems such as organoids, miniature organs grown in the petri dish from one or more cells. Combined with the genome editing tool CRISPR\/Cas as well as state-of-the-art microscopy, these models will help to understand how cells stay healthy or progress towards disease and react to therapeutics. Importantly, LifeTime scientists will also develop computational strategies such as powerful machine-learning and artificial intelligence methods that help to understand molecular mechanisms and predict the future of a patient\u2019s tissue or even means to steer the tissue towards health. This strategy is expected to improve early diagnoses and intervention, predict the course of a disease, identify new drug targets and select the most effective therapies for individual patients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Future and Emerging Technologies Flagships (such as the ongoing Human Brain Project, the Graphene and the Quantum Technologies Flagship) are funded by the European Commission with one billion Euros for ten years. The competition for the next two Flagships has just started, and proposals have been submitted. LifeTime \u2013 jointly coordinated by the Max Delbr\u00fcck Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association (MDC) in Berlin and the Institut Curie in Paris \u2013 is one of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Currently the LifeTime consortium consists of over 60 leading single-cell biologists, computer scientists, mathematicians, clinicians, pathologists, imaging experts, and physicists from over 50 European institutions in 18 countries. They are pioneers in their disciplines, working towards a common vision of future medicine, and would like LifeTime to be an open endeavor that will attract new talents and integrate all scientists in Europe who can make a significant contribution. Their unique collective network will transcend institutional boundaries and improve the overall infrastructure for the life sciences in Europe, with a focus on training for the next generation of scientists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The LifeTime consortium will build on the achievements of the Human Cell Atlas (HCA), an international project launched about a year ago. The HCA aims to create a map of healthy tissues with single-cell technologies, thereby capturing the enormous diversity of cell types within those tissues. LifeTime proposes to go far beyond providing static tissue maps and to track, understand and predict how the molecular make-up of cells changes during human diseases and ultimately intervene.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is a vision that can steer both life sciences and healthcare into the future and kick-start a single-cell innovation ecosystem in Europe. Many technologies at the center of LifeTime are key European research strengths that the Flagship could boost. These include single-cell technologies combined with advanced imaging, artificial intelligence and patient-matched organoids, or organ-on-a-chip disease models to study the progression of an illness and develop novel therapeutics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As an inspiration, LifeTime scientists name Renaissance Europe. Back then, new types of telescopes permitted Brahe, Galileo and Kepler to accurately map the precise positions of stars and planets. They were able to decode the patterns in these maps thanks to new types of mathematics developed by Leibniz and Newton, and thus discovered that celestial bodies moved in rule-governed and therefore predictable ways. Their efforts reshaped the society of their time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Similarly, emerging technologies now allow scientists to observe cells (corresponding to planets in this analogy) and entire organs (corresponding to solar systems) with unprecedented precision. New mathematical and computational tools will be required to understand the movement and relationships of those cells. The resulting ability to explain cellular changes as they age or progress towards disease will fundamentally change our perception of how organisms function and will greatly advance medicine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The more than 60 scientists and clinicians forming the LifeTime<\/a> consortium are distributed over 18 European countries and 52 institutions. Both the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres and the French National Center for Scientific Research CNRS \u2013 two of the biggest science organizations in Europe \u2013 have pledged their strong support. Furthermore, the consortium is endorsed by Science Academies such as the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the French Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Sciences and Arts and the EU-life Alliance. Professor Nikolaus Rajewsky, Director of the Berlin Institute for Medical Systems Biology at the Max Delbr\u00fcck Center for Molecular Medicine, and Professor Genevi\u00e8ve Almouzni, CNRS senior researcher and director of the research center at Institut Curie in Paris, are jointly coordinating the LifeTime proposal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Helmholtz Association \u2022 CNRS \u2022 Institute of Molecular Biotechnology \u2022 Research Center for Molecular Medicine of the Austrian Academy of Sciences \u2022 VIB-KU Leuven \u2022 Friedrich Miescher Institute for Biomedical Research \u2022 University of Basel \u2022 University of Zurich \u2022 Central European Institute of Technology \u2022 Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology and Epigenetics \u2022 Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics \u2022 German Cancer Research Center \u2022 Max Delbr\u00fcck Center for Molecular Medicine \u2022 German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases \u2022 Helmholtz Zentrum M\u00fcnchen \u2022 Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology \u2022 Helmholtz Institute of RNA-based Infection Research \u2022 Saarland University \u2022 Technical University Munich \u2022 University of W\u00fcrzburg \u2022 Biotech Research & Innovation Centre \u2022 Interdisciplinary Nanoscience Center \u2022 University of Copenhagen \u2022 Centre for Genomic Regulation \u2022 Institut Curie \u2022 Universit\u00e9 de Montpellier \u2022 Inserm \u2022 Universit\u00e9 Toulouse III \u2013 Paul Sabatier \u2022 \u00c9cole nationale sup\u00e9rieure des mines de Paris \u2022 Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland \u2022 The Biomedical Research Foundation, Academy of Athens \u2022 Weizmann Institute of Science \u2022 Hebrew University \u2022 Sapienza – University of Rome \u2022 Instituto Nazionale Genetica Molecolare \u2022 University of Napoli \u2022 University of Padua \u2022 University of Milan \u2022 European Institute of Oncology \u2022 Netherlands Cancer Institute \u2022 Radboud University \u2022 University Medical Center Utrecht \u2022 Hubrecht Institute \u2022 Instituto Gulbenkian de Ci\u00eancia \u2022 Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences \u2022 Romanian Center for Systems Immunology \u2022 Karolinska Institute \u2022 MRC Human Genetics Unit \u2022 University of Edinburgh \u2022 Wellcome Sanger Institute \u2022 The Babraham Institute \u2022 European Molecular Biology Laboratory – European Bioinformatics Institute<\/p>\n\n\n\nParticipating institutions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n