CAPSID

• Duration: 01.07.2018 – 30.06.2021
• Funded by: ERDF (European Regional Development Fund)
• Programme:  Interreg V-A Slovakia - Austria
• Partners:
  • Vienna BioCenter Core Facilities, GmbH (Lead partner)
  • Biomedical Research Center of the Slovak Academy of Sciences
• Total project costs: € 571,016 EUR
• Project website: capsid.vbcf.ac.at

The cross-border region between the capital cities of Vienna and Bratislava is characterized by a high number of universities and research institutes. However, few of these institutes have a strong international reputation in the biomedical sciences, and there is still a low level of knowledge-intensive services. With this project, we will respond to both challenges by:

• bringing international scientists to the cross-border region
• increasing training opportunities
• developing a new knowledge-intensive service focused on production of proteins and molecules required for biotechnology

We will create synergies between the two partners by using existing areas of expertise. The Austrian partner has expertise in protein production and provision of research services, while the Slovak partner is an expert on working with viral and secreted proteins, which are of interest to laboratories studying virology or cell surface receptors. Mutual collaboration of the project partners will be beneficial for both sides of the cross-border region with the prospect of increasing innovation capacity of the region in the fields of biotechnology and life science research. These activities will increase the number of staff working in research and lead to development of new services.

The long-term effects of this project will be:

• to increase cross-border research cooperation
• to facilitate access to cutting-edge research infrastructure for Slovak researchers
• to improve international visibility and reputation of the participating institutions.