Step Strong into 2025!

At the dawn of the 10th year of USERN activity, we appreciate the accompaniment of all USERN members in 2024. Below there is a brief summary of what we have done during this year and our plan for the future. At the end of this letter, there is an invitation to contribute to USERN activities in 2025.

USERN After 9 Years of Activity

USERN, with more than 26,000 members from >120 countries, has accomplished the publication of more than 2500 scientific documents, which has resulted in an H-Index of 105 during 9 years of fruitful activity. By the end of 2024, USERN has 66 USERN Junior Ambassadors (UJAs), 75 USERN Interest Groups (UIGs), 45 offices, and signed >130 Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs). 

USERN International Schools

Through its 9 years of activities, USERN has held different educational events, amongst which international schools were the most welcomed. Starting in 2018 in Italy then the year after in Turkey followed by India and Armenia in 2019, international courses and schools on the topic of immunology were held. Recently, after the successful experience of organizing the 1st Global Health School, hosted by Akkon University, in Berlin, Germany, USERN aimed to plan an amazing school on the topic of Inborn Errors of Immunity in Paris, a city filled with history, culture, and most importantly academics during May 28-31, 2024. The USERN Spring School on Inborn Errors of Immunity was co-organized by USERN and the Human Genetics of Infectious Diseases Laboratory of the esteemed Imagine Institute, in Paris, France. The school had two distinguished chairs: Professor Jean-Laurent Casanova, Director of the Human Genetics of Infectious Diseases Laboratory, and Professor Nima Rezaei, Head of the Research Center for Immunodeficiencies. Professor Emmanuelle Jouanguy and Professor Anne Puel, who are great scientists in the field of inborn errors of immunity, and members of the USERN Advisory Board, were also lecturers of this educational event focusing on inborn errors of immunity.Afterward, a new collaborative event took place with Danube Allergy Research Cluster (DARC), at the Medical University of Vienna, in Vienna, Austria. DARC is led by Professor Rudolf Valenta, who is one of the USERN Advisory Board members. The symposium was a one-day event taking place on Monday, June 3rd, 2024. Students and junior researchers had the chance to present their research in the form of short oral and poster presentations and receive comments from the experts in this field. A brief city tour, besides the academics, was given to the participants later on that day.

USERN Congress

The 9th International USERN Congress and Prize Awarding Festival was held on November 8th-10th, in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, which was a great picture of borderless international collaboration and scientific exchange. The congress was chaired by Professor Maria Tokmakova, Professor Mariana Murdjeva, Professor Tommaso Dorigo, and Professor Nima Rezaei. Participants from many countries and with different scientific fields joined the congress; the USERN Prize laureates, keynote lecturers, junior researchers, faculty members, ambassadors, and students were all happy experiencing an international scientific environment. Distinguished keynote speakers were Professor Frank Sellke, Professor Timothy Lyons, Professor Ute Romling, Dr. Joseph Firth, and Dr. Hassan Abolhhassani. The integration of science and art at the USERN Congress was depicted with a concert at the lyrical gala and different artistic performances.

USERN Prize

USERN prize is an international award, and it is annually bestowed to junior scientists or researchers less than 40 years of age for any novel advancement or achievement in scientific education, research, or serving the humanity in five scientific fields including Formal Sciences, Physical and Chemical Sciences, Biological Sciences, Medical Sciences, and Social Sciences.

On November 10th, 2024, the 9th USERN Prize Festival took place. The USERN medal and trophy were bestowed to the 5 USERN Laureates. In the following the name and the title of the Prize laureate in each field of science is listed:

• Formal Sciences: Andrea Luppi, UK

For “Synergistic information across artificial and biological intelligence”

• Physical and Chemical Sciences: Dongliang Chao, China

For “Finding safe, low-cost, and scalable aqueous battery technologies and its practical applications”

• Biological Sciences: Tiziana Cappello, Italy

For “EMBRYotoxicity tests and integrative multi-biomarkers and -OMICS to unveil the impact of microplastics and associated contaminants - EMBRYOMICS”

• Medical Sciences: Fabiana Corsi-Zuelli, Brazil

For “Peripheral blood immune signatures of psychosis; testing the regulatory T cell hypothesis”

• Social Sciences: Ewa Szumowska, Poland

For “Research program aimed at understanding proneness to extremism”

Advisory Board Awards

We are honored to have the accompaniment of USERN Advisory Board members in our scientific path and to have their support to young scientists. Every year, the USERN Advisory Board members, which are limited to top 1% scientists and Nobel/Able Laureates, are kindly invited to support juniors by providing small grants, which are titled after them, and allow the juniors to attend the USERN annual congress.

During 2016-2024, so far, USERN Advisory Board members have supported young scientists by contributing to USERN Prize 2022 by donating small grants (500 USD), which were awarded to the USERN Laureates under their name at the USERN International Prize Awarding Festival.

USERN Advisory Board Members Awards for USERN Prize 2024:

• Professor Steven Hayes USERN Award

• Professor George Perry USERN Award

• Professor Sudhir Gupta USERN Award

• Professor Bo-Qiang Lin USERN Award

• Professor Reza Malekzadeh USERN Award

• Professor Maziar Moradi-Lakeh USERN Award

USERN CSR: The 10th International Festival of Paintings for Pediatric Patients

Annually, the HEART group organizes the International Festival of Paintings for Pediatric Patients (IFPPP). This year, we have received more than 600 paintings, of which after the evaluation by international juries, the top 250 paintings were published in the IFPPP booklet. The top 3 paintings in each age group were awarded with the medal and trophy of the festival at the IFPPP closing ceremony. In November 2024, along with the first day of the USERN Congress, the closing ceremony of the 10th International Festival of Paintings for Pediatric Patients (IFPPP) was held (https://usern.org/heart).

Upcoming Event: The 10th International USERN Congress and Prize Awarding Festival, Sao Paulo, Brazil

You are cordially invited to the 10th International USERN Congress and Prize Awarding Festival, to be hosted by University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, on November 8-10, 2025. We will host Nobel Laureates and distinguished scientists as keynote speakers in the event. It will be a wonderful interdisciplinary scientific event and an integration of science and art. Mark your calendars for joining us on November 8-10, 2025!

An Invitation to Contribute 

Finally, with these last few lines we wish to renew our heartfelt invitation to actively contribute to some of the many activities we are involved in at USERN. As distinguished academics in scientific disciplines, we believe it is only natural for you to share USERN’s goals of a better diffusion of scientific knowledge, an easier access to scientific education, and better communication and cooperation in international research around the world.

Ways to get involved and contribute to USERN action abound. They include:

-        Making USERN better known in your community, inviting colleagues to become members, and top scientists to join the USERN advisory board; they can register on our website for free: https://usern.org

-        Helping us identifying potential candidates for the USERN prize, nominating them;

-        Helping us selecting the USERN prize laureates among researchers with less than 40 years of age, who distinguished themselves for exceptional contributions to scientific research;

-        Supporting USERN by sponsoring USERN prizes with a small donation (USERN Advisory Board Awards);

-        Proposing new interest groups aggregating USERN members in common research activities through our network;

-        Organizing events for the public, or schools for graduate students, or other science dissemination activities with the support of USERN;

-        Proposing the signing of Memorandum of Understanding between USERN and your institution, to state the intention of creating a steady collaboration for more internationalization of scientific and education activities between the two entities;

-        Contributing to the News section of our website, by offering press releases about important research to which you have taken part, or important conferences or events;

-        Declaring your interest in collaborating in authoring publications on the topic of science policy, which is at the focus of USERN.

-        Sharing with us the names, email, web site, affiliation, phone number, etc. (all info useful) about newsagents (science reporters, university bulletin offices, magazines) you have been in contact with, for the purpose of creating a mailing list and a press office at USERN.

-        Using the @Usern_net twitter handle in your tweets, whenever you distribute useful information about your research or significant educational activities. We will retweet it from our account!

-        Notifying us of any significant news we may consider advertising through our press office.

-        Plus many more.

So, in 2025, whether you are doing science or education, think at how that could help USERN!

With our best wishes for a scientifically fruitful and a happy 2025,

USERN Team