Report from the business trip, Barcelona, Ehdaa Abdelsalam

From October 3rd until December 1st, I visited the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM) in Barcelona for internship. During my stay I joined Dr. Mercedes Blazquez team at the department of Renewable Marine Resources – Reproductive Endocrinology Group in investigating the molecular players behind the emergence of earlier onset of puberty and reproductive cycles abnormalities among cultured European seabass population.

The overall research activity focuses on the transcriptomic analysis of potential modulations in key genes and methylation patterns in testicular tissues of male European seabass induced by modifiers from environment and rearing systems. My active participation in the practical and theoretical tasks related to the research topic enhanced both my intellectual and methodological skills associated to laboratory techniques and to aquatic animal health and welfare.

On top of that, colleagues at the ICM express their openness and welcoming of possibilities to future collaboration between the two institutes in scientific research and project calls.

My visit was funded by Erasmus+ program and project PROFISH.