The University of Trento and Humanitas University have signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement to strengthen collaboration on medical education and research. The agreement was signed by Rectors Paolo Collini for the University of Trento and Marco Montorsi for Humanitas University. "This agreement comes after years of collaboration in education and research between UniTrento and Humanitas University and makes our relationship stronger", commented Paolo Collini. "For our future, it is crucial for us to reinforce this relationship in the area of life sciences with a partner that has become a point of reference at national and international level. This collaboration is very important for us, especially for teaching and learning and in particular for the new School of Medicine".
"It is a pleasure for us to expand our collaboration with an excellent institution that has recently opened a medicine programme and which, therefore, has a strong focus on life sciences. This alliance is geared to innovation and has an international dimension that will make us build together research lines to make a significant contribution to technology transfer in the area of life sciences", commented Marco Montorsi, Rector of Humanitas University. "We also hope to facilitate the use of simulation training in medical school teaching, an approach that has always been part of the Humanitas University methods. The flexible and innovation-oriented environment of the University of Trento is ideal to integrate technological, digital and simulation skills. To conclude, we believe that students and the whole region benefit from the exchange of knowledge and experiences, and that is why we will stablish a mobility programme between the two universities, as it already occurs with some partners of the Provincial Healthcare System of Trentino that are part of the radiotherapy specialization school network".
In recent years the two universities have joined forces for a number of specific initiatives, including a study on the role of inflammation in dysfunction in synapses causing different brain disorders and a study on the identification of strains of bacteria that are responsible for tumour growth.
The agreement is based on mutual interests. The two universities are partners in joint research programmes in the area of biological and medical sciences, which are growing because of the increased availability of data and of better collection, analysis and processing. UniTrento and Hunimed have distinctive and complementary skills in the field of artificial intelligence, materials science, robotics and nanotechnologies that can be applied in the medical sector. The combination of these skills may facilitate the development of new knowledge, that can lead to better diagnosis and treatments.
With the strategic cooperation framework agreement, and building on their resources and expertise, the two universities aim to develop together joint research, innovation and training projects, in Europe and internationally.
The main goal of the education programmes is to train a new generation of doctors and highly skilled researchers who can take advantage of scientific and technological developments in the area of life sciences.
Part of the collaboration between UniTrento and Hunimed will work to transfer research findings to clinical practice and to promote the development of new treatments, and to bring patients' opinions and needs to research laboratories.
The framework agreement will last three years and will be managed by Olivier Jousson at UniTrento and Arturo Chiti at Hunimed. "I am pleased and honoured to start this collaboration with Humanitas University, which one of the most renowned research facilities in Italy providing excellent training in the medical and health sector", explained Jousson, who is also the director of the Centre for Medical Science of UniTrento. "In particular, in partnership with Milan Politecnico, Humanitas offers the innovative Medtec course in Medicine and Biomedical Engineering. The course offered by UniTrento is more traditional but includes tracks and seminars on nanotechnologies, robotics, artificial intelligence and on other themes that lie at the frontier of biomedicine, like precision medicine, gene and cell therapies, regenerative medicine. We therefore look forward to a very productive collaboration with Humanitas on these and other themes".
"Research groups of Humanitas University and UniTrento have already established collaborations focused on their respective fields of excellence, like neuroscience and the microbiota in cancer growth process", concluded Arturo Chiti, professor of Humanitas University and director of the Nuclear medicine unit at Humanitas. "The clinical and scientific expertise of Humanitas University matches perfectly with the approach adopted by University of Trento and based on the technology applied to medicine, in a collaboration that will open new opportunities for partnerships in the clinical sector for both universities, for example in nanotechnologies and robotics. With this collaboration, Humanitas and UniTrento will be able to participate in competitive European calls and will be more appealing to young researchers".
In 2020, the University of Trento established an inter-university single-cycle Master's degree in medicine and surgery (LM-41) with the University of Verona. Humanitas University, based in Pieve Emanuele (Milan), is an international university dedicated to life sciences and integrated with IRCCS Istituto Clinico Humanitas in Rozzano, an academic hospital and research centre. Both universities are located in areas where life sciences are considered a strategic specialization.