The University of Tartu (aka the national university of Estonia) received €60m in grant funding (distributed over the next 6 years) from the European Commission & the Estonian state to develop two international centers of excellence (receiving €30m each). The first center, which focuses on digitalized synthetic biology, is led by Professor Mart Loog of molecular systems biology & aims to facilitate the big data-driven design of cells (for the bio-industry). This center will upgrade the Estonian Centre for Biosustainability by setting up a digitalized & robot-assisted laboratory unit for building cell systems (aka a biofoundry) linked to IT units for software development, big data processing & ML. A startup accelerator is to be created alongside it. The second center, which focuses on personalized medicine, is led by Professor Mait Metspaul of evolutionary genomics. It builds on data from the Estonian Biobank (also based out of the University of Tartu) & will focus on evaluating the utility & cost-effectiveness of personalized healthcare services through clinical trials, as well as making electronic health records more usable & evolving legal frameworks. <Source: investinestonia.com>
