The NANEMIAR kick-off meeting was held today, on the 20th of November, in Murcia city, Spain. All institutions within the NANEMIAR consortium participated in this inaugural meeting, during which each member presented the progress made and outlined the subsequent steps for this innovative project.

The meeting was graced with the presence of Helene Le Borgne and Christina Kyriakopoulou from European Commission (EC Policy Officers from DG Research and Innovation).

The NANEMIAR project aims to develop a new therapy for patients suffering from congenital anemia, with the goal of improving their quality of life. Congenital anemias encompass a myriad of birth defects, which are highly complex disorders whose causes are largely unknown, and current treatments are often inadequate.

The consortium for this project, financed by the European Union and endowed with almost €2.7 million, consists of a promising Dutch SME (Mercurna BV) headed by Dr. van Asbeck -van der Wijst, and two partners from academia and research: Dr. Lachaud at CNRS in France, and Dr. Pérez-Oliva from IMIB-FFIS in Spain, who coordinates the action. The teams are supported by the hematology service of the Virgen de la Arrixaca University Clinical Hospital of Murcian Health Service, where hematologists Drs. Salido and Blanquer are part of this initiative.

Collectively, they aim to exploit Mercurna's mRNA technology platform to develop a novel targeted nanomedicine that enables the correct production of red blood cells in congenital anemia patients by expressing deficient proteins. Mercurna will concentrate on the targeted delivery of therapeutic mRNA to these cells, the CNRS team will test the safety and efficacy of the nanomedicine in anemia mouse models, and the Spanish team will conduct ex vivo testing on patient samples, commencing with a proof-of-concept for beta-thalassemia.