Application Deadline extended!

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Due to problems with the E-Mail address of Prof. Hallmann that was provided on The Prize - webpage, we decided to extend the application deadline until January 25th, 2012. We are sorry for any inconveniences that this might have caused and hope to get all potential applicants, which might have been discouraged by not being able to send their application, to submit their paperwork NOW! Good luck!

Application for the 2012 Werner Risau Prize

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A bit late this year - I am awfully sorry for this - but here it finally is: The application form (in the download section) for the next 2012 Werner Risau Prize award. The prize will again be handed over during the Annual Meeting of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Zellbiologie (DGZ). This time it will be their 35th Annual Meeting and it will be staged in the beautiful and booming city of Dresden between March 21 - 24, 2012. Don´t hesitate to apply, if you have an appealing study just published or in press, and which you are prepared to present to an international audience of dedicated cell biologists- it`s definitely worth it! If you don´t believe it - just try to google where some of the previous Werner Risau Prize winners are now advancing their career....

But remember: The application deadline is January 15, 2012! So do your paperwork and send it in ASAP!

Our 2011 awardee: Suphansa Sawamiphak

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As in the previous years, a new PDF kindly provided by the editors of Zellbiologie aktuell, the official magazine of the German Society for cell biology, is now available for download. In this article Suphansa Sawamiphak describes her studies on vascular sprout formation and the way how ehprinB2 controls VEGFR2 signaling in tip cell function during the directed migration of endothelial cells that ultimately lead to the formation of new blood vessels.

The 2011 Werner Risau Prize

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As in the previous years, you can find the application document for the next 2011 Werner-Risau-Prize in the download section. The prize will again be awarded during the Annual Meeting of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Zellbiologie (DGZ), which will be held from March 30 - April 2, 2011 in the city of Bonn this time. Don´t hesitate to apply, if you think you are qualified - it`s worth it! The application deadline is January 15, 2011.

Boris Strilic v2.0

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A new PDF kindly provided by the editors of Zellbiologie aktuell, the official magazine of the German Society for cell biology, is now available for download, in which Boris Strilic summarized his work on lumen formation in blood vessels. The corresponding publication of this work in the prestigious journal Developmental Cell eventually earned him the Werner-Risau-Prize.
And just as a side remark: Receiving the Werner-Risau-Prize usually does not harm your career - Boris Strilic is now a group leader in the department of Prof. Stefan Offermanns at the MaxPlanck Institute for Heart and Lung Research in Bad Nauheim, Germany.

The impact of Werner Risau´s work

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The reverberation of the novel concepts and views that Werner Risau had developed in the field of angiogenesis research, i.e. on the molecular mechanisms that direct the growth of new blood vessels in development and disease, can still be vividly heard - more than ten years after his death: In a very recent article published in The International Journal of Developmental Biology Domenico Ribatti from the University of Bari Medical School, Italy, reviewed the seminal work of Werner Risau in the study of the development of the vascular system and in particular on the formation and maintenance of the blood-brain barrier. Here is a link to the abstract. We will try to also make the PDF available in the download section. Please check back soon!

Boris Strilic: Our 2010 laureate!

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Better late than never! Finally, It is a great pleasure to introduce this years winner of the Werner-Risau-Prize for outstanding achievements in endothelial cell biology, Dr. Boris Strilic from the Heinrich-Heine University in Duesseldorf, Germany. With his seminal study (Dev Cell 17, 505-515) Boris Strilic and coworkers presented a series of elegant experiments that demonstrated a unique way how the lumen of newly formed blood vessels could be formed. This study was also featured by an extra comment in the same issue of Developmental Cell by Kevin Nelson and Greg Beitel and made it even to the cover page of this issue with one of the micrographs.

The 2010 Werner Risau Prize

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In the download section you now can find the application document for the 2010 Werner-Risau-Prize. As in the previous years, this prize will again be awarded during the Annual Meeting of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Zellbiologie (DGZ), which will be organized from March 10-13, 2010 in Regensburg this time. Don´t hesitate to apply, if you think you are qualified - it`s worth it! There is the money of course, but you will also have a great audience for the presentation of your scientific work and lots of possibilities to meet with others in a very nice setting.

Our 2009 laureate: Tuomas Tammela

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It is a great pleasure to announce this years winner of the Werner-Risau-Prize for outstanding achievements in endothelial cell biology, Dr. Tuomas Tamela from the Molecular Cancer Biology Laboratory at the University of Helsinki. With his Nature 2008 article on the role of VEGFR-3 signalling for the formation of new blood vessel during physiological as well as disease processes, he eventually came out first from a group of very strong competitors. VEGFR-3 stands for Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Receptor-3 and represents one of the tyrosine kinase receptors that is present on the surface of developing blood vessels and lymphatic endothelium that binds certain members of the VEGF growth factor family (in mammals there are five of these VEGFs). In his study, Dr. Tammela could show that blocking VEGFR-3 signalling decreased various important aspects of angiogenesis (such as sprouting, branching, proliferation). These observations suggest that targeting VEGFR-3 could serve as an efficient means to block the formation of new blood vessels, which in turn would help in diseases that are characterized by excessive blood vessel growth such as diabetic retinopathies or the accelerated growth of solid tumours.

Re: DGZ Meeting in Konstanz

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Please note that the next Meeting of the DGZ will be be held March 24-27, 2009. In the information leaflet available in the Download section March 25-28 was mentioned. An updated version of the prize information document is now available for downloading. Please adjust your schedules accordingly. Sorry for any inconveniences!