The first Scientific Advisory Board Meeting was held successfully at BIOPIC on June 7th, 2011. The meeting was attended by six of the eight board members:

 

Professor David Bensimon, Research Director of ABCD Biophysics Lab at Ecole Normale Superieure de Paris; Prof Tom Maniatis, Chair of Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics at Columbia University and Member of US National Academy of Sciences; Prof. Stephen Quake, Co-Chair of Department of Bioengineering at Stanford University and HHMI Investigator; Prof. Yi Rao, Dean of School of Life Sciences at Peking University; Prof. Yigong Shi, Dean of School of Life Sciences and Deputy Vice Dean of School of Medicine at Tsinghua University; Porf. Xiaowei Zhuang of Chemistry and Physics at Harvard University and HHMI Investigator.

 

 

Representing BIOPIC, Professor Sunney Xie gave the board a detailed overview of the center, including the background of the launch of the center, its scientific vision and research areas, current projects, and achievements and progresses made in recruitment and infrastructure, etc.

 

After the review talk, BIOPIC PIs Yanyi Huang, Fuchou Tang, Xiaodong Su, Xinsheng Zhao, Yujie Sun and Sunney Xie reported to the board about the construction of their labs, as well as the undergoing projects. After the talks, the board members were given an in-depth lab tour of BIOPIC labs, including the Sequencing Platform, Integrated Biology Laboratory, Laboratory of Single Molecule and Live Cell, Single Molecule Biophysics Laboratory, Stem Cell and Epigenetics Laboratory, Coherent Raman Scattering Microscopes Platform, etc.

 

The board members and Prof. Xie then held a meeting to fully discuss the strength and weakness of PIs and projects. They also gave many beneficial opinions and recommendations.

 

 

The board members agreed that in the half year since the official launch of the center, BIOPIC had made tremendous progresses and achieved a lot in various aspects. BIOPIC now enjoys state-of-arts facilities and abundant supports. They expected that BIOPC would make significant contributions to its chosen fields.

 

Another board member, Prof. Barbara Wold, Director of Beckman Institute at California Institute of Technology had listened to the reports before this meeting. Prof. Xiaodong Wang, Director of National Institute of Biological Sciences and Member of US National Academy of Sciences, and also a board member, will visit BIOPIC on June 27th.

 

More discussions will follow after this meeting and a review report is expected to be completed in a couple of months.