Clinatec is a

biomedical Biomedicine (also referred to as Western medicine, mainstream medicine or conventional medicine)

research center based at the Polygone Scientifique in

Grenoble Grenoble ( ; ; or ; or ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of the Isère Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regions of France, region ...

. Doctors, biologists and micro- and nanotechnology experts work side by side at the 6,000 m² facility. Around a hundred researchers and employees work at the center. When it opened at the end of 2011, it was hailed as the first center of its kind in the world. With six hospital rooms, cutting-edge medical imaging equipment and an operating suite, Clinatec was developed by the Research Division of the CEA (French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission), Grenoble-Alpes University Hospital (CHU),

Inserm The (Inserm, ) is the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research. History and organisation Inserm was created in 1964 as a successor to the French National Institute of Health. Inserm is the only public research institution ...

and the Université Grenoble Alpes. The primary focus is on

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving Cell growth#Disorders, abnormal cell growth with the potential to Invasion (cancer), invade or Metastasis, spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Po ...

neurodegenerative diseases A neurodegenerative disease is caused by the progressive loss of neurons, in the process known as neurodegeneration. Neuronal damage may also ultimately result in their death. Neurodegenerative diseases include amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, mul ...

and

disability Disability is the experience of any condition that makes it more difficult for a person to do certain activities or have equitable access within a given society. Disabilities may be Cognitive disability, cognitive, Developmental disability, d ...

Background

Professor Alim Louis Benabid and Jean Therme first met back in 2006. Alim Louis Benabid is a neurosurgeon. Together with Professor Pierre Pollak, he developed a new treatment for

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

deep brain stimulation Deep brain stimulation (DBS) is a type of neurostimulation therapy in which an implantable pulse generator is stereotactic surgery, surgically implanted subcutaneous tissue, below the skin of the chest and connected by Lead (electronics), leads ...

. His work received recognition in 2014 with the

Lasker Award In 1945 Albert Lasker and Mary Woodard Lasker created the Lasker Awards. Every year since then the award has been given to the living person considered to have made the greatest contribution to medical science or who has demonstrated public ser ...

and in 2016 with the

European Inventor Award The European Inventor Award (formerly European Inventor of the Year Award, renamed in 2010), are presented annually by the European Patent Office, sometimes supported by the respective Presidency of the Council of the European Union and by the Eur ...

. Jean Therme is Director of Technological Research at CEA Grenoble. He has worked tirelessly to make Grenoble a key center of expertise in electronics and micro- and nanotechnology, and to encourage close collaboration between the worlds of research and industry. Both men were convinced that millions of lives could be transformed by merging medical research and technology R&D. They agreed that the way to achieve this would be to bring together doctors, researchers, biologists, engineers, robotics engineers, mathematicians and knowledge engineers to work at a single site. In 2010–11, the 6,000 m² building was built and equipped. In 2013, the first patient was admitted to the center, in relation to the "Protool" clinical trial coordinated by Professor Berger. For the first time, it was possible to use non-invasive procedures to explore regions of the brain that had hitherto been inaccessible. The exciting prospects opened up by this technology, the result of the coupling of technology developed at CEA-Leti with the clinical approach taken by researchers at Grenoble-Alpes University Hospital (CHU),

and the Université Grenoble Alpes, led to setting up the MedPrint start-up, which won an I-lab award in 2015. In 2014, Clinatec launched a campaign to raise 30 million euros in order to develop a number of projects, including: *the Brain Computer Interface (BCI) project aiming to prove that a quadriplegic patient can drive neuroprosthetic effectors with multiple degrees of freedom, such as an exoskeleton, based on decoding cortical signals (ElectroCorticoGrams) measured by a Wimagine implant, and can do this through training to make the most of their cerebral plasticity, *and the Near InfraRed (NIR) project aiming to demonstrate that near-infrared light can have neuro-protective effects in treating Parkinson's disease.

Founding Members

Clinatec is the outcome of a solid partnership between the CEA (French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission), Grenoble-Alpes University Hospital (CHU),

and the Université Grenoble Alpes.

The clinatec endowment fund

The Clinatec

endowment fund A financial endowment is a legal structure for managing, and in many cases indefinitely perpetuating, a pool of financial, real estate, or other investments for a specific purpose according to the will of its founders and donors. Endowments are ...

was set up in 2014. A sponsorship campaign has been launched, aiming to raise 30 million euros by 2018.

Awards

Lasker Award

Professor Alim Louis Benabid, Clinatec's founder and chairman of the board, member of the

French Academy of Sciences The French Academy of Sciences (, ) is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific method, scientific research. It was at the forefron ...

, is one of the joint winners of the prestigious Albert-Lasker Award for clinical research awarded by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation in New York. Professors Alim-Louis Benabid and Mahlon R. Delong of Emory University received awards for their contributions to the development of

. The technique consists in stimulating the subthalamic nucleus to inhibit tremors and restore motor function in patients with Parkinson's disease and from complications caused by

Levodopa Levodopa, also known as L-DOPA and sold under many brand names, is a dopaminergic medication which is used in the treatment of Parkinson's disease (PD) and certain other conditions like dopamine-responsive dystonia and restless legs syndrome. ...

, a drug widely used in treating the disease.

Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences

Set up in 2013 by

Mark Zuckerberg Mark Elliot Zuckerberg (; born May 14, 1984) is an American businessman who co-founded the social media service Facebook and its parent company Meta Platforms, of which he is the chairman, chief executive officer, and controlling sharehold ...

and Priscilla Chan of

Facebook Facebook is a social media and social networking service owned by the American technology conglomerate Meta Platforms, Meta. Created in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with four other Harvard College students and roommates, Eduardo Saverin, Andre ...

Sergey Brin Sergey Mikhailovich Brin (; born August 21, 1973) is an American computer scientist and businessman who co-founded Google with Larry Page. He was the president of Google's parent company, Alphabet Inc., until stepping down from the role on D ...

, founder of

Google Google LLC (, ) is an American multinational corporation and technology company focusing on online advertising, search engine technology, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, consumer electronics, and artificial ...

, and

Yuri Milner Yuri Borisovich (Bentsionovich) Milner (, ; born 11 November 1961) is a Soviet-born Israeli entrepreneur, investor, physicist and scientist. He is a co-founder and former chairperson of internet company Mail.Ru Group (later VK), and a founder ...

and

Anne Wojcicki Anne E. Wojcicki ( ; born July 28, 1973) is an American entrepreneur. She is known for co-founding the personal genomics company 23andMe. Early life and education Wojcicki was born in Palo Alto, California, the youngest of three sisters: Susan W ...

, the founders of

23andMe 23andMe Holding Co. is an American personal genomics and biotechnology company based in South San Francisco, California. It is best known for providing a direct-to-consumer genetic testing service in which customers provide a saliva testing, sali ...

, the

Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences The Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences is a scientific award, funded by internet entrepreneurs Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan of Facebook; Sergey Brin of Google; entrepreneur and venture capitalist Yuri Milner; and Anne Wojcicki, one of t ...

is awarded to researchers whose work extends human life expectancy. Professor Alim Louis Benabid was awarded the prize in 2015 for the development of

, a technique which has revolutionized the treatment of

European Inventor Award 2016

On June 9, 2016, Professor Alim Louis Benabid received the

2016 for his work on

. The technique, now used all over the world, has radically transformed the lives of more than 150,000 people with Parkinson's disease, and significantly improved their quality of life.

Media interest

In July 2012, Philippe Pozzo di Borgo, rendered quadriplegic following an accident and the man whose story was the inspiration for the French film Intouchables, visited Clinatec with a group of local journalists. He expressed his confidence in and admiration for this research program in a report aired on regional news channel,

France 3 Alpes France 3 Alpes is one France 3's regional broadcasting services to people in the Rhône-Alpes region. It was launched as ORTF Rhône-Alpes in 1968. It is headquartered in La Tronche. The service is also one of 2 services to be broadcast to people ...

Hero's Intouchables visiting Clinatec
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References

External links

Clinatec official website
(English)
Clinatec official website
(French) {{Authority control Neuroscience research centers in France Nanotechnology Grenoble Alpes University Science and technology in Grenoble Research and development