VIRCAN2024 Conference

Sessions

SESSION 1. COMMON AND SPECIFIC MECHANISMS OF VIRAL ONCOGENICITY

Sections:

Molecular drivers of malignant transformation.
Metabolic signatures of chronic viral infections & cancer.
Immune response in chronic viral infections and cancer (Inflammation & Immune Evasion)

SESSION 2. APPROACHES TO CHRONIC VIRAL INFECTION AND CANCER CURE

Information TBC

SESSION 3. HUMAN PAPILLOMA VIRUS, CHRONIC INFECTION & ASSOCIATED CANCERS, ON THE WAY TO PROTECTION

Sections:

Epidemiology & Risk Factors
Mechanisms of HPV-associated carcinogenesis
HPV infection & cancer surveys
Prophylactic and therapeutic HPV vaccines & their implementation

All sessions will be opened by invited plenary lectures.

Invited lectures

Isabelle Chemin & Boun Kim Tan (Center for Research on Cancer, Lyon, France), "HBV Vaccination - Success and Barriers to Achieve HBV Eradication"
Joakim Dillner (Karolinska Institutet, Sweden), "HPV Vaccination, HPV Screening, and Perspectives of HPV Elimination"
Elena Kashuba (RE Kavetsky Institute of Experimental Pathology, Oncology and Radiobiology of National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Ukraine), "DNA Tumor Viruses and Their Role in the Development of Epithelial Tumors"
Anda Ķīvīte-Urtāne (Rīga Stradiņš University, Riga, Latvia), "Epidemiology of Infection with High Risk HPVs, Risk Factors in Different Population Groups"
Ujjwal Neogi (Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden), "Metabolic Changes in Viral Infections"
Ratna Ray (Department of Pathology, Saint Louis University, USA), "Bitter Melon's Sweet Promise: Role in Oral Cancer Therapy"
Ruth Tacheze (Faculty of Science, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic), "HPV Infection: Present and Future of Diagnostic and Prognostic Surveys"
Anna Zajakina (Latvian Biomedical Research and Study Centre, Riga, Latvia). "Viral Vectors and Photosensitive Drugs as Immunomodulators in Cancer Treatment"

Registration

To participate in the VIRCAN2024 conference, you need to register. Registration is free of charge.

To register, please send the following information to vircan2024gmail[pnkts]com:

First name, surname
Are you an early-career researcher (under 36 years old by the time of the conference)?
Country, city
Affiliation (department, institute)
Position
Email, phone number (Whatsapp, Telegram etc.)
Do you want to participate with a presentation?

N.B.! If you want to participate with presentation, please submit your abstract(s) to vircan2024gmail[pnkts]com. Submission can be done at the time of registration, or by the deadline - 24 October.

Abstract submission

Indicate the session you want to present at (see below) and the length of your presentation.

Session 1. Common and specific mechanisms of viral oncogenicity;
Session 2. Approaches to chronic viral infection and cancer cure;
Session 3. Human papilloma virus, chronic infection & associated cancers.

Abstract submission opens 24 September 2024, and closes 24 October 2024.

All abstracts should be submitted to vircan2024gmail[pnkts]com. You can submit your abstract together with your registration, or later, by the deadline.

All submitted abstracts will be reviewed by a board. Decisions will be communicated to registered participants via email by 4 November 2024. Authors of abstracts accepted for oral presentation will be given slots of 10 - 20 min., and authors of abstracts accepted for poster presentation will receive a 5 min. slot in their selected sections.

Abstract format

Please, submit your abstract via e-mail in the following format:

Word file;
Times New Roman font, size 11;
one line spacing;
Length of the text (without title, authors’ names, affiliations) is limited to 500 words.

Regular abstracts

Abstract should contain the following components:

Title (not more than 150 characters with spaces);
Authors (surname, first name), indicate the corresponding author;
Affiliations for all authors;
Background: a concise statement of the issue under investigation or a hypothesis;
Materials & Methods: the experimental methods used (including the statistical analyses employed);
Results: specific findings;
Conclusions: a summary of findings that are supported by your results (statistical analyses used to support the conclusions);
Acknowledgements, references to publications (max 5)

Abstract can contain one figure with legend, or one table in good resolution for direct reproduction. Max volume of the abstract with illustration should not exceed two pages. The maximum size of the abstract file is 2 megabytes.

Abstracts of invited plenary lectures

Abstracts should contain the following components:

Title (is not more than 150 characters with spaces);
Authors (surname, given name), indicate the corresponding author;
Affiliations for all authors;
Background: describe the importance of the revised field of research;
Aim(s): subject of the review;
Topics overviewed: short description of the overviewed topics; own findings of the author in this context;
Conclusions: resume of the progressed achieved so far and perspectives for the development.
Acknowledgements, references to publications (max 5).

Publication

Accepted abstracts will shape conference program. Final program will be published on the conference web site on the server of Rīga Stradiņš University (RSU) in the middle of November 2024.

Abstracts will be compiled into an Abstract book which will be available on-line on the conference website.

Presenting authors will be invited to submit manuscripts describing their experimental studies, short communications, as well as reviews, opinions, comments to the special issues Vaccines (from all three sessions), and Frontiers in Oncology (from session 3 on HPV, chronic infection & associated cancers). The organising committee plans to publish a conference report reviewing all presented studies in Vaccines (MDPI).

Early-career researcher contest

The organising committee will be organising a contest for participants aged 36 or under. Presentations of early career researchers will be assessed by an independent board of five reviewers consisting or one professor, one associated professor, two senior researchers, and one PhD student. The presentations will be assessed using a number of criteria and the 1st, 2nd and 3rd best based on the total ranks. Winners will receive monetary awards sponsored by Vaccines, and winners of the 1st and 2nd awards will be offered free publications in the special issue of Vaccines.