News and cools

2023 - Comment article published in Clinical Nutrition, suggesting the need for future research on sarcopenic obesity.

Sarcopenic obesity research perspectives outlined by the Sarcopenic Obesity Global Leadership Initiative (SOGLI) – proceedings from the SOGLI Consortium meeting in Rome November 2022

I participated to the meeting as an expert on sarcopenia. Below please find the link to access the fulltext

Elsevier Share Link: https://authors.elsevier.com/c/1gnOuxUE3j7FZ

2018 - Physiactisome: un brevetto in collaborazione Sapienza Università di Roma - Università di Palermo - Sorbonne Université

Press release

Palermo, 29 Nov 2018

Physiactisome: a product of engineered muscle cells to mimic physical exercise

iBioTHEx, an international spin-off involving Sapienza university of Rome, the University of Palermo and Sorbonne UNiversity, presents its product Physiactisome. The patented prodoct is a procedure to obtain secreted vescicles (exosomes) from muscle cells, genetically modified and cultured in vitro. This product mimics what physiologically happens in an organism following physical exercise. The vescicles contains substances having beneficial effects on the skeletal muscle tissue and can be used to counteract severe forms of muscle atrophy, such as the muscle wasting associated to cancer, organ failure or Alzheimer disease (cachexia). Currently Physiactisome is validated in pre-clinical models and we aim it to be the first treatment against muscle atrophy. A prominent feature of Physiactisome is that it can be tailored on the patient, since to produce it we can use the patient's stem cells obtained from a muscle biopsy. Since cachexia accounts for a significant percentage of the deaths, base on its anti-cachectic effetcs Physiactisome is capable not only to increase survival of the patients but also to ameliorate their quality of life and helping to keep them in shape for a better response to the pharmacological treatmnets against the primary disease.

iBioTHEx was founded by Prof. Valentina Di Felice (Università di Palermo) and co.: Dr. Antonino Marchese (Palermo), Prof. Dario Coletti (Università Sorbona di Parigi e Sapienza di Roma), and Dr. Paolo Gasco (Ceo di Nanovector srl, Torino). The main goal of this spinoff is to bring Physiactisome on the market, while offering consulting services on demand, exploiting the expertise of his members on nanovectors. iBioTHEx was ranked 3rd at StartCup Palermo 2018 (26 Sept 2018), among the 6 finalists of StartCup Sicilia for PNICube 2018 (22 Oct 2018), and won the support of the incubator Consorzio Arca Palermo.

Traction (scientific publications):

Physiactisome: A New Nanovesicle Drug Containing Heat Shock Protein 60 for Treating Muscle Wasting and Cachexia. Di Felice V, Barone R, Trovato E, D'Amico D, Macaluso F, Campanella C, Marino Gammazza A, Muccilli V, Cunsolo V, Cancemi P, Multhoff G, Coletti D, Adamo S, Farina F, Cappello F. Cells. 2022 Apr 21;11(9):1406. doi: 10.3390/cells11091406.
Skeletal muscle Heat shock protein 60 increases after endurance training and induces peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma coactivator 1 α1 expression. Barone R, Macaluso F, Sangiorgi C, Campanella C, Marino Gammazza A, Moresi V, Coletti D, Conway de Macario E, Macario AJ, Cappello F, Adamo S, Farina F, Zummo G, Di Felice V. Sci Rep. 2016 Jan 27;6:19781. doi: 10.1038/srep19781.

Sede legale e laboratori scientifici

Dipartimento di Biomedicina, Neuroscienze e Diagnostica Avanzata

Università degli Studi Università

Via del Vespro 129

90127 Palermo, Italy

+39 3928378584

Laboratori Scientifici Francesi

University Pierre et Marie Curie Paris 6

(attualmente Sorbonne Université)

Institute of Biology Paris-Seine

B2A Biological Adaptation and Ageing

(CNRS UMR 8256-INSERM ERL U1164-UPMC P6)