LAMIG brief history
A group of Latin American scientists working in mucosal immunology met in Belo Horizonte (Brazil) from July 7-9, 2016 for the inaugural meeting of the Latin American Mucosal Immunology Group (LAMIG). The meeting included two activities: a Workshop on Mucosal Immunology (July 7th and 8th), and a private meeting of the scientists who had been involved in the creation of LAMIG (July 9th).
The Mucosal Immunology workshop consisted of four sessions which included talks of scientists from all over the region and highlighted the broad spectrum of mucosal immunology research taking place in Latin America. More than 250 scientists, most of them PhD students and young researchers, took part in the workshop.
Thanks to the financial support of the SMI, the workshop had two keynote speakers: Daniel Mucida (The Rockefeller University) and Kevin Maloy (Oxford University). Both invited speakers gave extraordinary talks, were present during the whole symposium, and led stimulating discussions with speakers and participants. The Workshop was highly successful because of the scientific quality of the presentations, together with the active discussions and positive interactions among participants, especially the attending students.
On July 9th, 31 scientists from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico and Uruguay met to discuss the strategic framework of the new network.
There were 10 presentations from representatives of different regions, providing an overview of ongoing research, expertise and capabilities in each center. Dr. Kevin Maloy then described how SMI and the European Mucosal Immunology Group (EMIG) interact, and explained the complementary aims of these organizations. This information was extremely useful in forming the discussions on the organization of the new LAMIG network.
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Aims of LAMIG
In order to provide a framework to promote the interaction among scientists from the region with interests in mucosal immunology, the aims of LAMIG are:
- Organization of Meetings and Symposia
- Organization of basic and advanced courses on Mucosal Immunology
- Promote the exchange of PhD students or postdocs to get training in specific techniques in laboratories members of the network
- Generate a network for Grant Applications
- Search funding for research and teaching activities
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LAMIG Board
The group decided that a board of five members will be appropriate to fulfill the aims of LAMIG. This board will be formed by scientists who are actively working in the field, are representative of different regions, are in close contact with International organizations and want to get committed to developing/coordinating the actions already planned.
Changes to this board will be discussed in next meetings. The group decided to nominate as board members to:
Fernando Chirdo (Argentina)
Ana Maria Caetano Faria (Brazil)
Manuel Franco (Colombia)
Marcela Hermoso (Chile)
Leopoldo Flores-Romo (Mexico)
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LAMIG network
In order to enlarge our community, members were asked to comment on this initiative to colleagues that may be interest in take part of the mucosal immunology network in LatinAmerica. Scientists from areas such as: infectious diseases in lung, skin, genitourinary tract, parasitology, vaccines, immunotherapy, autoimmunity, allergy, cancer, among others, are welcomed to join us.
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LAMIG also wants to enlarge the network with well-established LatinAmerican scientists who are currently working in major centers outside LatinAmerica. They were nominated as LAMIG Associated Members