NEWS
OUR ALUMNI: Lluís Armengol i Dulcet, CSO, CEO and one of the founders of qGENOMICS, Barcelona, Spain
I have a degree and a PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Barcelona. Besides being the father of three, I am currently the CSO and CEO of qGenomics, a Catalan biotech company. My contact with research started with cell biology at the Department of Cell Biology in the Faculty of Biology at the UB.The initial part of my thesis introduced me to the world of molecular and human genetics, at the now defunct Institute for Cancer Research, before taking the leap to the new-established CRG, in the group of Xavier Estivill. Here I began to apply computer sciences to solve biological problems, in full swing of the Human Genome Project. I learned a lot and have really good memories of that time, thanks to all of my colleagues in both the Genes and Disease group and the Bioinformatics and Genomics group of Roderic (Guigó). During this stage of my doctorate, I was able to work for short terms abroad, which showed me that the level of resources and knowledge of our local research groups were not far from those of the top labs in our fields.
After a short postdoc, I had the chance to move to the ‘dark side’ of science... and the knowledge that we acquired and generated at this stage was the seed to create qGenomics, the first spin-off from the CRG. qGenomics is dedicated to the research and development of solutions to improve human health using tools and resources derived from genomics. Although we founded the company in a bit of a rush, I think we should all be very satisfied because it is an exemplary case of using research (which is now called “translational” research) to promote CRG and the country.
The CRG is truly a great setting, and I hope that the PhD students, postdocs, researchers and the diverse staff of the centre, as well as the centre itself, do not forget the need to do everything in their power to bring their excellent scientific knowledge to society.This allows it to be transformed and used for the multiple facets of societal wellbeing, so that we are giving back for the support and public financing we have received for R&D.