SERBIAN ASSOCIATION FOR CANCER RESEARCH
The First Scientific Meeting of the Serbian Association for Cancer Research
29 – 30 November 2012
Sava Center
Belgrade
Republic of Serbia
“The First Scientific Meeting of the Serbian Association for Cancer Research” was held in Sava Center in Belgrade on 29th and 30th November 2012. It was organized together with the meeting of the Serbian Medical Society named “49th Kancerološka nedelja” (“49th Cancerologic Week”). The main topic of “The First Scientific Meeting of SDIR” was “The Novelties in Cancer Research”. We hope that we have succeeded to deliver new data in the field of basic and translational cancer research.
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| prof. Sonja Levanat and dr Zorica Juranić (from left to right) |
prof. Yehuda Shoenfeld |
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| prof. Yehuda Shoenfeld and prof. Sonja Levanat (from left to right) |
PhD students: Ana Damjanović Veličković, Ivana Matić, Branka Kolundžija and Nađa Grozdanić Stanisavljević (from left to right) |
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| Katarina Jovanović, Ksenija Brotto, Zaki Abu Rabi, Emina Mališić and Radmila Janković (from left to right) | Ana Vuletić, Miodrag Gužvić and Ivana Božović (from left to right) |
Our invited speakers were Prof. Yehuda Shoenfeld and Prof. Sonja Levanat, the president of Croatian Association for Cancer Research (HDIR). Both lectures were sponsored by EACR. Prof. Shoenfeld from Israel gave the lecture on prospective role of vitamin D in the prevention of malignant and autoimmune diseases, emphasizing the important connection between immunity and cancer. Our invited speaker from Croatia, prof. Sonja Levanat presented the new data on the involvement of the Hedgehog signaling pathway in the pathogenesis of ovarian carcinoma and colon cancer and suggested the potential of developing better therapies based on the inhibitors of Hh-Gli pathway. Dr Zorica Juranić, the SDIR president, highlighted the significance of nutrition for cancer prevention by giving the comprehensive overview of results from own laboratory as well as the new literature data in this field of research.
We were honored that the participant of our First Scientific Meeting was prof. Engin Ulukaya, the president of the Turkish Association for Molecular Cancer Research.
The poster session included 25 quality poster presentations and was the place of exchange of novel data in oncology research through lively and exciting discussions. Different aspects of cancer research were covered by the poster presenters, including anticancer agents’ research, tumor biology, molecular genetics of cancer, tumor immunology and translational research. EACR sponsored three awards for the best poster presentations (first award – 300 €, and two second 2x 100 €). The winners had an opportunity to give an oral presentation. In the award committee were prof. Ljiljana Vučković-Dekić, dr Gordana Bogdanović and dr Zorica Tomašević. Miodrag Gužvić won the first prize for poster entitled: “Identification and molecular characterization of founder cells of prostate cancer metastasis”. Second prize got Ivana Božović (poster: “Prognostic, predictive abilities and concordance of Bcl2 and tp53 protein expression in primary breast cancers and axillary lymph nodes”). The other second prize was given to Ana Vuletić (poster: “In vitro activation of NK cells from regional lymph nodes of melanoma patients with IL-2 and IL-15 is associated with mature perforin production followed by increase in several activating receptor expression on NK cells”).
In order to strengthen the precious collaboration between cancer researchers and clinicians, crucial for true significant advance in oncology, we decided to organize our scientific meeting in the frame of “49th Kancerološka nedelja”, well-known as the largest meeting of oncologist in Serbia. For that reason our first meeting was a valuable opportunity not just for integrating basic and clinical studies, but also was an excellent chance for further SDIR promoting. This year “49th Cancerologic Week” was devoted to the subject of infectious agents as a cause of neoplastic diseases; 450 participants (medical doctors, cancer researchers and nurses) attended the meeting.
We express gratitude to EACR for precious support and sponsorship of “The First Scientific Meeting of SDIR”. In addition, we are grateful to prof. Svetislav Jelić, president of “Cancerologic Section” of the Serbian Medical Society and to prof. Zora Nešković-Konstantinović for their help in organizing our first scientific meeting. Also we thank speakers for giving the excellent lectures, to the members of the award committee, and to all participants of the meeting for providing helpful exchange of information on cancer research.
SDIR president
Dr Zorica Juranić
SERBIAN ASSOCIATION FOR CANCER RESEARCH
The Serbian Association for Cancer Research (SACR) was founded in November 2010 at Belgrade.
SACR’s Head Office was located at the Institute for Oncology and Radiology of Serbia.
SDIR is a non-profit association, established to achieve the objectives in the field of oncology.
The objectives of the association are:
1. Improvement of conditions for cancer research,
2. advanced training,
3. organization of study members at home and abroad,
4. organize professional meetings to exchange scientific information.
Institute of Oncology and Radiology of Serbia
Pasterova 14,
11000 Belgrade
Telefon: 381 11 2067.210
Fax: 381 11 2685.300
E-mail: juranicz@dls.ncrc.ac.rs
Website: www.sdir.ac.rs