Description

Department OncoGen Young Researchers constitutes an educational context in which high school students and students have the opportunity to train in the field of biomedical research and benefit from the support of experienced researchers from the Center for Gene and Cell Therapies in Cancer Treatment - Center of Excellence OncoGen for the development of research projects that can be concluded by writing and publishing scientific articles and participating in congresses and competitions.

The center OncoGen wants to stimulate the creative capacity of young people and guide them to make the best choices regarding their further education. In this sense, the collective OncoGen will support you in the preparation of admission files to universities and master's programs abroad and beyond.

Historic

Volunteering and research mentoring activities within the Center for Gene and Cell Therapies in Cancer Treatment – OncoGen continued the efforts of the center's researchers that began in 2011 in the form of a scientific circle held within the Immunology-Physiology discipline of UMFT. To date, OncoGen Center continuously supported the fundamental research education of students from the specialized faculties by integrating them into the VADA program in the disciplines of Immunology and Allergology, Biology and Physiology from the "Victor Babeș" University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Timișoara. In addition, the OncoGen Center has always responded positively to proposals for the involvement of foreign students, who came to Timișoara through the Erasmus and SCOPE/SCORE programs.

In 2017, the OncoGen Association began promoting scientific research in the biomedical field among high school students. Due to the considerable interest shown by the students in the research, through the Timiş County School Inspectorate, students and teachers from the best high schools in Timișoara were invited for a visit to the OncoGen Center.

Among the notable results of the students who participated in this event, we also mention the participation in the competition ICCET 2019 – International Conference on Computing in Engineering and Technology, with the final at Moscow, which deals with themes of molecular biology and genetic engineering. The winning team, from BioCoderDojo Timișoara, was formed by Sergiu Micorici, Mihai Frăcea, Alexia Vîrgă, Raluca Bozan, Diana Poenaru, Lucas Misckolczi and Erick Boroș. In the 2019 edition, the topic of technology was discussed CRISPR, technology that won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 2020.

pilot project, OncoGen Young Researchers took off after the aforementioned team and the already existing volunteers have OncoGen Center were involved in the development the vaccine against infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The volunteer team worked on a molecular modeling project in silico for the identification of mutations at the Spike protein level in the virus structure.

In 2021, part of the collective OncoGen Young Researchers, within OncoGen Association started the project Yerevan – Discover the world of biomedical research which entailed both the development of an alternative for SARS-CoV-2 virus detection tests based on CRISPR technology, as well as training a number of 50 high school students from all over the country in the use of fundamental research techniques through a virtual laboratory.

In May 2022, the group OncoGen Young Researchers contribute to the organization of the competition Asthmathon by OncoGen alongside Romanian Society of Allergology and Clinical Immunology. Asthmathon is an event that allows high school students and students to get involved in identifying and developing innovative solutions to limit the effects of asthma on the population. In November of the same year, a team led by Mr. Prof. Univ. Dr. Virgil Păunescu evaluated and awarded a series of projects within the competition UniHack organized by the AC League. The following year, the OncoGen Association, along with OncoGen Young Researchers coordinated the bioinformatics and medical informatics category of the hackathon HackTM.