ESPCR blog

Share/Bookmark

Prof. Alain Taïeb, Chair of the 21st IPCC, Bordeaux, France, 21-24 September 2011

Yesterday, September 24, the 21st IPCC finished with the moving song “Black or White“, by Michael Jackson. This was a really nice end for this conference, that progressed with a great success in attendancy (>540 delegates registered) over the past week. The meeting was particularly successful thanks to the excellent scientific program that the Chair of the meeting, Prof. Alain Taïeb, and his team put together. The Organizers of the 21st IPCC must be praised for this memorable superb meeting, where the latest scientific achievements of our pigment cell community were discussed and most adequately mixed with the tasty products of the surrounding vineyards.

Palais des Congres, Bordeaux, France, venue of the 21st IPCC

At the International Federation of Pigment Cell Societies we are already preparing our next meeting. Prof. Boon-Kee Goh (ASPCR) will be the Chair of the 22nd IPCC, that will be held in Singapore in September 2014. At the closing ceremony of IPCC-2011, Prof. Boon-Kee Goh presented the highlights of his country and the spectacular resources existing in Singapore. You are all invited to attend the next meeting of the International Federation of Pigment Cell Societies, IPCC-2014, in Singapore. News and information on the IPCC-2014 will be made available from its web site: http://www.ipcc2014.org

Share/Bookmark

Melanins and Melanomes, Borovansky & Riley (eds.), Wiley 2011

A new book has been published on Pigment Cell Biology. The book is entitled “Melanins and Melanosomes: Biosynthesis, Biogenesis, Physiological, and Pathological Functions“, has been edited by Jan Borovansky and Patrick A. Riley, and published by Wiley (2011). Both Patrick Riley and Jan Borovanskly are ESPCR Honorary members. The chapters have been prepared by world-known experts in the field of Pigment Cell Biology, most of them are members of the IFPCS, through any of its affiliated sister societies.

Table of contents:

• Chapter 1: History of Melanosome Research (Jan Borovansky).
• Chapter 2: Classical and Nonclassical Melanocytes in Vertebrates (Sophie Colombo, Irina Berlin, Veronique Delmas, and Lionel Larue).
• Chapter 3: Biological Chemistry of o-Quinones (Patrick A. Riley, Christopher A. Ramsden, and Edward J. Land).
• Chapter 4: Biosynthesis of Melanins (Jose Carlos Garcia-Borron and M. Concepcion Olivares Sanchez).
• Chapter 5: Inhibitors and Enhancers of Melanogenesis (Alain Taieb, Muriel Cario-Andre, Stefania Briganti, and Mauro Picardo).
• Chapter 6: Structure of Melanins (Shosuke Ito, Kazumasa Wakamatsu, Marco d’Ischia, Alessandra Napolitano, and Alessandro Pezzella).
• Chapter 7: Properties and Functions of Ocular Melanins and Melanosomes (Małgorzata Rozanowska).
• Chapter 8: Biological Role of Neuromelanin in the Human Brain and Its Importance in Parkinson’s Disease (Kay L. Double, Wakako Maruyama, Makoko Naoi, Manfred Gerlach, and Peter Riederer).
• Chapter 9: Biogenesis of Melanosomes (Cedric Delevoye, Francesca Giordano, Michael S. Marks, and Graca Raposo).
• Chapter 10: Transport and Distribution of Melanosomes (Mireille Van Gele and Jo Lambert).
• Chapter 11: Genetics of Melanosome Structure and Function (Vincent J. Hearing).
• Chapter 12: Physiological and Pathological Functions of Melanosomes (Jan Borovansky and Patrick A. Riley).
• Chapter 13: Dysplastic Nevi as Precursor Melanoma Lesions (Stanislav Pavel, Nico P.M. Smit, and Karel Pizinger).

IFPCS Members are entitled to a 25% discount on books published by Wiley

Share/Bookmark

Prof. Marco d'Ischia at the ESPCR 2010 meeting in Cambridge (UK)

On behalf of the President of the International Federation of Pigment Cell Societies (IFPCS), Prof. Shigeki Shibahara, the President of the European Society for Pigment Cell Research (ESPCR), Prof. Lionel Larue, and of the ESPCR Awards Committee, it is my pleasure to announce and congratulate the next H. S. Raper Medal awardee: Prof. Marco d’Ischia (University Federico II, Naples, Italy).

The H.S. Raper Medal is an Award selected by the ESPCR as an international recognition of outstanding contributions to the biochemistry and molecular biology of pigmentation. At the time of the official banquet of the forthcoming XXIst IPCC2011 (September 24-26, 2011; Bordeaux, France), the IFPCS President will present the H.S. Raper Medal to the Awardee. The H.S. Raper Medal was instituted by the ESPCR to perpetuate the memory of Prof. Henry Stanley Raper, for his pioneer contributions to the field of biochemistry of melanins and its precursors. The list of previous H.S. Raper Medallists include: Profs. John Pawelek (1993), Giuseppe Prota (1996), Kowichi Jimbow (1999), Anthony Thody (2002), Sho Ito (2005) and José Carlos García-Borrón (2008).

Prof. Marco d’Ischia leads the group of Bioactive and Bio-inspired Product Chemistry at the Department of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of Naples University Federico II. He has published  some 200 publications in the fields of organic and bioorganic chemistry and biochemistry, on peer-reviewed international journals but also reviews and book chapters, including more than 45 papers on melanin-related topics. Currently, Prof. Marco d’Ischia is the promoter and scientific coordinator of EuMelaNet, an interest group/research network within ESPCR constituted in 2009, with the aim of promoting research on melanins and melanogenesis at multidisciplinary level and offering their collective knowledge and expertise to meet the growing demand for new bio-based materials on the part of companies and health institutions.

Share/Bookmark

New: register for printed annual PCMR subscription any time during the year!

New: now, starting in January 2011, it is still possible to register and request for hardcopy annual Pigment Cell & Melanoma Research (PCMR) subscription through ESPCR any time during the year, extending the previous announced deadline, established on December 31st. The IFPCS has extended this possibility thereby making possible to register, pay and receive printed issues of the PCMR journal throughout the year. Please visit the updated JOIN/RENEW web page and select your new registration/renewal with (+additional 70 Euros, on the top of the standard ESPCR annual membership fee) or without hardcopy subscription to PCMR. Please contact the ESPCR Treasurer  at treasurer@espcr.org in case of any doubt, comment or question.

Share/Bookmark

Renewing your 2011 ESPCR Membership before December 31st, 2010

All ESPCR Members are kindly requested to renew their current ESPCR Membership in 2011 before December 31st, 2010.  Here, you can read a 2011 welcome letter from the ESPCR President. As you know, we would need all current ESPCR members to renew and express their interest on printed copies of PCMR before December 31st, 2010. Prices and conditions are identical to 2010. Therefore in your annual membership fee (105 Euros for regular Members, 70 Euros for Students) it is already included the mandatory subscription to online PCMR contents, through the IFPCS web site. Those interested in purchasing 2011 hardcopy subscriptions of PCMR they will have to add extra 70 euros to their annual membership fees. 

If you have any question or comment, please contact us at: registration@espcr.org

Thanks for your collaboration and your continuous support to ESPCR,
  
Best regards
  
ESPCR AISBL

Share/Bookmark

Message from Lionel Larue, President of ESPCR:

Professor Estela Medrano at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, died prematurely in a tragic car accident on Monday August 30th, 2010. It is a real loss for the community and for all her friends, which were numerous in our field. Our heart felt sorrows go out to her husband and family, but no verbal or written condolences can possibly do justice to the depth and sincerity of our feelings of sympathy.
All the best
Lionel Larue, Institut Curie, Orsay, France
President of ESPCR

Share/Bookmark

Vitiligo Book, Edited by Mauro Picardo and Alain Taïeb

A new book on “Vitiligo” has been just published by Springer, 2010. The book is edited by Prof. Mauro Picardo (Vice-President of IFPCS and former President of ESPCR) and Prof. Alain Taïeb (Secretary of ESPCR and member of the IFPCS council). Most of the authors responsible for the different book chapters are also IFPCS members.

Extracted from Springer’s web page: “Vitiligo is one of the most common cutaneous disorders. Great numbers of affected patients suffer from the high stigmatizing impact of this disease. Up to now, clinical guidelines for the treatment of vitiligo were non-existent. In order to fill this void, this textbook defines and gives a complete overview of the disease, both regarding the classification of differential diagnosis as well as the treatment. Written by the most authoritative experts in the field, all therapy recommendations are based on new evidence-based guidelines. It includes case studies with illustrations before and after the treatment in order to demonstrate the treatment success. This textbook will be a valuable resource for all physicians who are seeing patients with this disease“.

Table of Contents:

Section I: Defining the Disease.- Section II: Understanding the Disease.- Pathophysiology Overview.- Generalized Vitiligo.- Genetic.- Environmental Factors.- In Vivo Data.- Animal Model.- In Vitro Approaches.- Oxidative Stress.- Immune/Inflammatory Aspects.- Cytokines and Growth Factors.- Proopiomelanochortin and Related Hormones in Vitiligo.- Segmental Vitiligo.- The Concept of Mosaicism Applied to SV.- Neural Hypothesis.- In Vivo Data.- In Vitro Data.- Editor’s Synthesis.- Section III: Therapy.- How to Manage the Patients: Overview.- Evidence Based Medicine.- Phototherapies.- Local Treatments.- Systemic Treatments.- Non Defined Treatments.- Surgical Therapies and Combined Therapies.- Camouflage: Practical Aspects.- Patient’s Perspective.- Editor’s Syntesis.- Conclusions.- Appendix.- Treatment Regimen (Phototherapies): Pratical Aspects.- Techinques for Grafting.- Index

Share/Bookmark

ESPCR

The new ESPCR Society, “ESPCR AISBL“, has just established a brand new bank account where we will be processing all your membership payment requests. However, at the moment, unfortunately, we can’t accept payments by credit card. We will try to have this option operative as soon as possible. Therefore, currently, ESPCR AISBL can only accept payments by Bank Wire Transfer or by Cheque.

Payment through BANK WIRE TRANSFER using IBAN and BIC bank account codes is the preferred form of payment. Payment by Bank Wire Transfer is not surcharged. Payment by Cheque is surcharged with 15 Euros.

Deadline for receiving your application for 2010 ESPCR Membership is December 31st, 2009. We have established this early deadline to fulfill our compromises with the Publisher of PCMR, the scientitic journal associated to IFPCS, where ESPCR is part of the Federation. Please proceed to apply for 2010 ESPCR Membership following the provided indications in this web site.

If you have any question, please contact the ESPCR Treasurer by email: treasurer@espcr.org.

Share/Bookmark

IFPCS

PCMR access through IFPCS web site

Members-Only Area of IFPCS WEB SITE

Registered IFPCS Members are entitled to access full online contents of the scientific journal Pigment Cell & Melanoma Research (PCMR), through the MEMBERS-ONLY area of the IFPCS web site. Exclusive access requires unique (personal) username and password combinations, available for each registered IFPCS member. These parameters can be easily requested to the system, which will send an automatic reminder to the email address associated to the corresponding registered IFPCS Member.

If you are a registered IFPCS Member and fail to access the MEMBERS-ONLY area of the IFPCS web site, please contact the IFPCS webmaster who will fix the problem and inform you what to do.

Share/Bookmark

PASPCR 2009 Meeting

Updated information about the next PASPCR 2009 Meeting, to be held in Memphis (TN, USA), on September 4-7, 2009, organised by Prof. Andrzej Slominski, is available in this most updated flyer.

The topics of this meeting will include:

• Biochemistry, Chemistry, and Biophysics of Melanin Pigmentation
• Cell Biology of Melanin Synthesis
• Malignant Transformation of the Melanocyte and Melanoma Progression
• Cell Surface and Nuclear Receptors and Their Ligands
• Melanocyte Maturation/Differentiation
• Oxidative Responses in Melanocytes and Melanoma Cells
• Solar Radiation and the Pigmentary System

Confirmed invited speakers include:

Sergei Grando, MD, PhD (University of California Irvine)
F. Holick, MD, PhD (Boston University)
Lawrence Pfeffer, PhD (University of Tennessee)
Michael Kastan, MD, PhD (St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital)
Ralf Paus, MD (University of Lubeck)
Jack Arbiser, MD, PhD (Emory University)
Russel J. Reiter, Ph.D., Dr.h.c.mult. (University of Texas, San Antonio)
Edwin Blalock, PhD (University of Alabama)
Gregory Barsh, MD, PhD (Stanford University)
Andrzej Slominski, MD, PhD (University of Tennessee)
Dianna Johnson, PhD (University of Tennessee)

official email address of this meeting: info@paspcr2009.org

official web page address of this meeting: http://www.paspcr2009.org