Diego Arango, new IRBLleida director

The board of the Institute of Biomedical Research of Lleida- Fundació Dr. Pifarré (IRBLleida) has appointed Dr. Diego Arango as director of the institute. Arango, head of the Biomedical Research Group of Digestive Treatment Tumors and coordinator of the Research Area of ​​Oncology of the Research Institute of the Vall d'Hebron University Hospital (VHIR), replaces the position of the Professor of Medicine from the University of Lleida, Elvira Fernández.

Dr. Diego Arango graduated in Biological Sciences in 1994 at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain) and obtained his PhD in 1998 at the University College Dublin (Ireland), where he became familiar with the anatomy and physiology of the intestine, and studied different ways of manipulating the cell cycle of intestinal stem cells in an attempt to minimize the side effects of radiotherapy in the abdominal and pelvic region. From 1999 to 2003, Dr. Arango was a Postdoctoral Fellow and an Instructor of Medicine at the Albert Einstein Cancer Center in New York (USA), where he gained extensive knowledge on the different genomic approaches to understand the molecular differences between normal and tumor tissue as well as between tumors from patients with good and bad prognosis or response to treatment. Dr. Arango moved in 2003 to the Center of Excellence in Disease Genetics at Biomedicum Helsinki (Finland) as a Visiting Scientist, where he began different lines of independent research aimed at the molecular classification of colorectal cancer.

Dr. Arango has more than 70 publications in leading magazines and several patents of biomarkers of prognosis and response to the treatment of cancer. He is also a regular reviewer for over 50 leading journals in his field (including Nature Communications, Gastroenterology, Cancer Research, Oncogene, Clinical Cancer Research and Gut) and participates in the evaluation of national and international projects.

The new direction has as challenges the leadership of European projects, the increase of the clinical trials and the capture of talent that allows to assure the future of the institution and to be a reference in the field of the research of our country.