Gov4Nano will design and establish a well-positioned and broadly supported Nano Risk Governance Council (NRGC). Organizing, connecting and engaging are key activities in Gov4Nano and its creation of a sustainable NRGC. Gov4Nano will develop an operational trans disciplinary Nano Risk Governance Model (NRGM) for nanotechnologies, building on an established governance framework developed by the International Risk Governance Council (IRGC). Engaging stakeholders (including regulators) to proactively address nano-specific safety and seek dialogue for joint activities. NRGC and its precursor project Gov4Nano will engage, in order to support these activities, with the broad variety of stakeholders across all relevant nano-disciplines (chemical, biocides, food and feed, pharma and medical devices and materials development) and draft a review on our knowledge progress over the last decade whilst initiating dialog. To boost the quality of the dialog it will create a platform for dialogues between stakeholders in a “trusted environment” inclusive of civil society. The NRGC core business is to coordinate, guide and harmonize in order to overcome the fragmentation of current knowledge, information and needs over various sectors and disciplines (workers, consumers/patients, environmental safety) and to prepare the transfer of this knowledge. To that end, the NRGC will be equipped with a self-sustainable NanoSafety Governance Portal (NSGP) consolidating state-of-the-art and progressive nanosafety governance tools including ones for dialogues and measuring risk perception. Major efforts will be towards requirements for data harmonization and data curation to be defined and laid down in guidance on obtaining harmonized and standardized quality-scored data collections promoting a big data approach for nano-toxicology. Research activities will be initiated for regulatory sound knowledge in support of harmonized (OECD) guidance for characterization and testing of nanomaterials.

The overall objective will be to create and mobilise an International network of high calibre centres around a strong European group of institutes selected for their appropriate expertises, to collect, amplify, characterise, standardise, authenticate, distribute and track, mammalian and other exotic viruses. The network of EVAg laboratories including 25 institutions represents an extensive range of virological disciplines. The architecture of the consortium is based on the association of capacities accessible to the partners but also to any end-users through the EVAg web-based catalogue. This concept has been elaborated and tested for its efficiency during the successful EVA project (FP7). The project will integrate more facilities dedicated to high risk pathogen (HRP) manipulation (1 in EVA, 13 in EVAg) The access to products derived from those HRP will be enhanced and for instance the production of diagnostic reagents will be facilitated. The new project will also provide access to high containment biosafety facilities to carry out in vivo studies of infectious disease using natural or models hosts, to look at prophylactic or therapeutic control measures and to develop materials for the evaluation of diagnostic tests, meaning an extensive capacity to service and to training. EVAg will also link up with other network-based virus-associated programmes that exist globally. However, looking further ahead, EVAg is conceived ultimately to be an open entity aiming at developing synergies and complementarity capabilities in such a way as to offer an improved access to researchers. This project will generate the largest collection of mammalian viruses in the world and move beyond the current state-of-the-art to provide an increasingly valuable resource and service to the world’s scientific community, including government health departments, higher education institutes, industry and, through information systems, the general public.

Emerging infectious diseases (EID) do not respect borders. They rank as global catastrophic risks for humanity, along with climate change and biodiversity loss. The COVID-19 pandemic showed how coordination of global research, through cooperation, and sharing of data and expertise, are crucial for efficient and effective preparedness to EIDs, and vital for a rapid response. Nevertheless, there are still major challenges limiting global cooperation among high containment laboratories (HCLs). HCLs are critical infrastructures for the development of medical countermeasures (e.g., vaccines and therapeutics) against high consequence pathogens. In order to fulfil its role, and given the global threat of EIDs, the European Research Infrastructure on Highly pathogenic Agents (ERINHA), together with its partners, proposes to establish and reinforce interactions with HCL research infrastructures (RI) worldwide, to strengthen pandemic preparedness and response capacities. INTERCEPTOR (INTERnational Cooperation of high containment research infrastructures: from Epidemic Preparedness TO Response), a consortium with key HCLs from Europe and across the world, will focus on access provision to HCLs, enhancement of the human capital of HCL, including in biorisk management, critical resources sharing, harmonisation and interoperability. The proposed actions will help ensure broader access to state-of-the-art HC facilities, while respecting the necessary biosecurity and biosafety constraints, and promote the establishment of a sustainable global network of HC RIs. By expanding access to HC RIs, strengthening the human capital base, promoting sharing of knowledge, skills and experience, and providing opportunities for common training programmes and staff exchanges, INTERCEPTOR will reinforce the next generation of HCL researchers and facility managers, and extend the opportunities for access to HCLs, required to push the boundaries of science and innovation in the field of EIDs.

The main aim of the proposed project is to use genomic epidemiology of tuberculosis, malaria and emerging and re-emerging pathogens in Africa as to better understand disease etiology, dynamics of disease transmission, and evolution of drug-resistant pathogens. The study also aims to increase Africa's capacity in bioinformatics, genomics, genomics data management, biobanking, and promote data sharing. Our goal is to improve the health of Africans with innovations in disease surveillance, equip the next generation of African scientists with cutting edge skills and strengthening south-south research collaborations. We propose the following hypotheses: 1. Increased capacity in genomic epidemiology will enable more effective disease surveillance in Africa. 2. Increased capacity in biobanking and genomics data management and analysis in Africa will enhance regional surveillance of infectious diseases and encourage timely and effective responses to emerging pathogens. 3. Regional whole genome sequence-based surveillance will improve the detection of DR-TB and inform the development of more sensitive and specific rapid diagnostics for the detection and surveillance of DR-TB in Africa and elsewhere. 4. Regional genomic surveillance of malaria parasites will inform a pre-emptive detection of emerging DR parasites and measure the impact of programmatic interventions for a data driven decision making by policy makers. 5. Implementation of harmonized genomic data analysis tools will allow the creation of continent-wide surveillance networks able to identify cross-border spread of DR variants and emerging pathogens. To achieve this, PANGenS will develop genomic epidemiology capacity across Africa by establishing a collaborative framework that brings together all expertise to perform trainings and implementation in all relevant components ranging from wet lab to bioinformatics, and establish proof-of-concept studies for TB and malaria in in selected partner countries