__welcome to brain malformations: the final conference of neuro-mig cost action
_due to the exceptional situation caused by the pandemic of covid-19, the final conference of neuro-mig COST action CA16118 is scheduled online. all the conference proceedings will be held on march 9-11, 2021 via microsoft teams.
_about
_among congenital brain disorders, malformations of cortical development (mcd) are a group of rare diseases, but constitute a major cause of chronic epilepsy and psychomotor disability worldwide. little is known about the natural history and no curative therapy exists. the etiology is mainly genetic, and rarely environmental or multi-factorial, but diagnosis requires special expertise among neurodevelopmental disorders. the emergence of novel neuroimaging and genomic technologies potentially allows rapid and accurate characterisation and gene discovery, but challenges scientists and clinicians of efficiently interpreting and translating these data for the benefit of patients. in europe, expertise on mcd is very fragmented and confined to personal interest of a few experts and basic scientists studying cortical development are not always connected with clinicians. this action, funded by european cooperation in science and technology, for the first time, brought together clinicians and researchers in the field of brain malformations (neurogenetics, pathologists, molecular/cell biologists and neuroscientists), to create the interdisciplinary, pan-european network neuro-mig, advancing the understanding of mcd pathophysiology and translating this knowledge to improve the diagnostic and clinical management of the patients. after four years of this network’s work, it is time for a summary and discussion open to the entire community dealing with interdisciplinary mcd research.
_to participate in this virtual and free conference, we invite everyone interested in the international debate on the mcd, but also those who want to learn about the outcomes of the action’s activities or show the results of studies not carried out under the action. we believe that the proposed conference is likely to advance the field in a highly synergistic manner and will contribute to the further development of the neuro-mig network.
