Newsletter 01/08

Dear Colleagues and Friends

The first issue of the EuroBoNeT newsletter has finally come out. This is an important communication tool intended to contribute to the exchange of information and ideas within the Network of Excellence and to their spread beyond the boundaries of our group. In the future we are committed to increasing both the quality and the quantity of the content. Of course this largely depends upon willingness to provide information, reports, images concerning the various activities currently carried on by the Network. As you may be aware, the main goal of EuroBoNeT is to promote integration among the different groups and institutions and, hopefully, the Newsletter will soon become instrumental in achieving this important result.

Angelo Paolo Dei Tos

Coordinator Update

The EuroBoNeT consortium is now in its third year of existence, which is an appropriate time point to inform you via this newsletter on progress and future plans. The Network shows considerable progress in integration with now amongst others a fully operational virtual tissue bank, website, technical platforms and exchange of staff members between institutes. These integrated activities are of vital importance for the Network and forms its backbone.

With the web-based virtual tissue bank we are able to overcome the problem of scattered resources of available valuable tumour material for research. As such we were able to conduct research on a first series of rare tumours using each others tumour banks scattered over Europe, such as on chondromyxoid fibroma, chordoma, Ewing.s sarcoma, giant cell tumours and osteosarcoma. The effectiveness of this virtual tumour bank has made it possible to extent our ambitions even to rarer tumours of bone such as vascular tumours, Langerhans cell histiocytoses and patients suffering from Ollier.s disease.

The website (www.eurobonet.eu) gives information to the general public, and in the members. section practical administrative information like forms and reports can be found. Moreover, in the members. section, exchange of uniform research protocols, unpublished results, and a Q and A section has shown its great value. As a result now the labs can work according to agreed protocols, comment and amend these protocols, and share unpublished data for comments.

Molecular tumour genetic techniques on these rare tumours ask for specific expertise and technical platforms enable us to overcome variations present in individual labs. These platforms are now fully operational giving highly standardised results which not only give high level information on the tumour samples studied in question, but also make it possible to compare these results with the ones obtained from other type of samples. It also gives access of these high-tech facilities to those partners who would not have them available at hand .

Exchange of knowledge is vital to this network, and we are very happy with the ongoing

exchange of especially young scientists, who can built up expertise and bring this home to their originating department. Next to staff exchange the network has shown educational activities by organising courses in the UK, Hungary, Italy, Belgium, and thereby spreading knowledge to the community outside the Network. Contact with patient organisations is growing, but this might need some more encouragement. Via patient organisations we can share knowledge, while some are very active in providing their patient data via informed consent. Links with patient organisations via the website have been operational often in a reciprocal manner. The two annual meetings (Treviso, Oxford) so far were a get together of partners discussing in an open manner the ongoing research projects and educational activities. These meetings are vital to strengthen contacts and to use each others. comments on ongoing projects in order to improve collaboration. It also gives the possibility to be confronted with scientific approaches in other research fields and departments. The informal and interactive character of these meetings gives an optimal atmosphere to discuss unfinished projects, initiate new ones and is an added value over the research line meetings which focus more on operational management of the ongoing projects within the individual research lines. For the next years we will further focus on ongoing integration activities, building on strengthening the technical platforms and sharing knowledge with other NoEs such as Conticanet. One of the initiatives on study is the launch of a combined sarcoma case report journal and a joint meeting. Moreover development of diagnostic and treatment guidelines for bone tumours in collaboration with the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) is foreseen. As such we look forward to keeping you informed about next year.s progress but in the mean time invite you to use the information available via our website www.eurobonet.eu and provide us with useful information for the website or the next newsletter via eurobonet@lumc.nl.

Yours truly,

Pancras C.W. Hogendoorn, MD,PhD Professor of Pathology Leiden,University,Coordinating Chairman EuroBoNeT

ANNUAL EUROBONET MEETING OXFORD

Oxford provided good weather and a pleasant venue for the 2008 EuroBoNeT meeting. The meeting began with a description of staff exchange experiences from members of several EuroBoNet research groups. This was followed by a report of progress in the technology plaforms, specifically those concerned with RNA expression microarrrays, bioinformatics, proteomics and immunohistochemistry, tyrosine kinases, telomerase studies, cell lines, tissue arrays and functioning of the Biobank. These talks provided an opportunity to review the integration objectives of EuroBoNet, regarding training and education, standardisation in technology and sharing of materials.

On the following two days, talks and posters from each of the research lines were presented. These included in Research Line 1, updates on the identification of molecular and cytogenic analysis of chondrosarcoma, chondromyxoid fibroma and hereditary mulyiple exostosis. In Research Line 2, work on the analysis of transcription factors and signalling pathways in osteosarcoma was presented and there was discussion regarding the therapeutic potential of the targets identified.A large number of research groups were involved in the CGA analysis of chordomas and profiling of fibrosarcomas of bone. In Research Line 3, the role of EGFR signalling and chromosomal instability and recent work on hypoxia and RANKL-independent mechanisms of osteoclast formation in Paget.s disease and giant cell tumour of bone was presented.

This was followed by a report from Antwerp regarding the origin and spread of the Paget’s disease sequestosome 1 In Research Line 4, work on the EWS-FLI1genes, CD99, and reports on NK cell-mediated therapy, remodelling angiogenesis in Ewing.s xenografts and work on the effectiveness of an antibody targeting the IGF-1R pathway in Ewing.s sarcoma was presented. The talks in all the research lines were supplemented by a very large number of posters from all the EuroBoNet groups. There was considerable interest in the posters and discussion which continued well beyond the poster sessions.

The invited speaker was Professor S L Teitelbaum who gave a fascinating talk on osteoclast pathobiology. This talk was warmly received by the audience who appreciated that Professor Teitelbaum, an osteoarticular pathologist himself, made an effort to relate scientific advances in osteoclast biology to the pathology of neoplastic diseases of bone.

The meeting was held in a very good spirit and provided an excellent forum for the critical analysis of the results and achievements of the EuroBoNet groups. Organisational and financial matters were also efficiently dealt with by the Network Director who was warmly thanked for all his hard work. At this meeting it was possible to appreciate how EuroBoNet has been so effective in bringing together the expertise, technology and knowledge of so many groups which formerly worked in isolation. The sum of EuroBoNet is clearly greater than its parts.