Units

IB² Interuniversity Institute of Bioinformatics in Brussels

IB² is a collaborative bioinformatics research environment in Brussels. The goal of the IB² is to bring together research groups in and around Brussels requiring bioinformatics and computational biology expertise. IB² is an interuniversity, cross-faculty (Medicine, Sciences, and Applied Sciences) collaborative space located on the La Plaine campus of the Université Libre de Bruxelles.

Institute of Interdisciplinary Research in human and molecular Biology

IRIBHM is part of the Medical School of the Univerité Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and one of the largest research structures of the university.
Founded in the nineteen sixties with the aim of applying an interdisciplinary approach to the study of thyroid pathophysiology, the Institute has thrived over the years into a number of independent groups with diversifying research interests. Presently, about 130 researchers and technicians are working in the Institute over a range of subjects encompassing signal transduction, development, neuroscience, and cancer, using cell and molecular biology approaches. Staff researchers include physicians, physicists, bioinformaticians, (bio)chemists and biologists. The activities of IRIBHM are mainly taking place on the Erasme campus of ULB, in the suburb of Brussels, although the Institute also contributes to the Institut de Biologie Moléculaire et Médicale (IBMM) on the Gosselies campus. The heavy equipment is common to the whole Institute and often shared with other groups of the campus as technical platforms. This includes genomics, proteomics, transgenesis, FACS and confocal microscopy facilities.

Projetcs

Microarrays

DNA microarray is a powerful technology that provides the expression profile of thousands of genes simultaneously. Applications to cancer biology and diagnosis include molecular tumor classification, drug sensitivity, or identification of tumor-specific molecular markers. In the field of drug discovery and development, it can help identifying appropriate targets for therapeutic intervention, as well as monitoring changes in gene expression in response to drug treatments. We have implemented this technology and are currently focused on gene expression profiling of thyroid tumors, and transcriptional regulation promoted by specific receptors in leucocytes.

Simulation of biological systems, bioinformatics, biostatistics

The quantitative interpretation of biological data requires the use of computer assisted approaches. A first approach consists of the statistical analysis of data in order to support relevance and significance of biological observations. A second approach deals with the elaboration and the computer simulation of models in order to test the validity of intuitively proposed schemas of regulation pathways. Theoretical studies have been especially conducted in the field of second messenger-controlled cascades (cyclic AMP, InsP3 , Ca2+) and receptor activation (TSH receptor, InsP3-receptor-Ca2+-channel).