ICFO – The Institute of Photonic Sciences was founded in 2002 in the Mediterranean Technology Park in the metropolitan area of Barcelona, the institute currently hosts 400 people, organized in 26 research groups in 60 state-of-the-art research laboratories. Research lines encompass diverse areas in which photonics plays a decisive role, with an emphasis on basic and applied themes relevant to medicine and biology, advanced imaging techniques, information technologies, a range of environmental sensors, tunable and ultra-fast lasers, quantum science and technologies, photovoltaics and the properties and applications of nano and quantum materials such as graphene, among others. In addition to two consecutive accreditations of the Severo Ochoa national program for research excellence, ICFOnians have been awarded 15 elite ICREA Professorships and 36 European Research Council grants. ICFO participates actively in the European Technological Platform Photonics21 and is very proactive in fostering entrepreneurial activities, spin-off creation, and creating collaborations and links between industry and ICFO researchers. To date, ICFO has helped create 7 start-up companies.
The Medical Optics group led by Prof. Dr. Durduran has pioneered the development of diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) and its multi-modal implementations for clinical applications.
Turgut Durduran (PhD, Group Leader/Professor) is a professor/group leader at ICFO and the holder of a prestigious ICREA professorship. He has started the ICFO-Medical Optics group in 2009 when he joined ICFO as an assistant professor/junior group leader. In 2014, he has received his tenure and became a professor/group leader. In 2015, he became an ICREA, Catalan Institution for Research and Advanced Studies, professor at ICFO. Over the years, the group has grown exponentially with eighteen PhD students, post-docs and engineers collaborating with about a dozen hospitals and biomedical institutes world-wide. He collaborates extensively with colleagues from the UK, USA, Italy, Denmark, Germany, Austria and France. He has led as a principal investigator or participated as a work-package leader/CO-PI in several collaborative research projects funded by the National Institutes of Health (USA), Ministry of Science and Innovation (Spain), Spanish health ministry (ISCIII), the Spanish ministry of science and innovation (MICINN), Catalan regional government (“Generalitat”) and the European Council. He has coordinated, multi-partner projects from the Spanish government. He currently coordinates a European H2020 project, LUCA, for developing an optical-ultrasound hybrid system for thyroid cancer screening. He has been a WP leader in two European projects- BitMap and BabyLux. A project funded jointly by the Catalan autonomous government and the European Union which has led to the formation of a spin-off company, HemoPhotonics (Spain). Over the years, he has participated in many grant review boards ranging from the National Institutes of Health to the review of the FP7 projects at the European Commission. He has authored over a hundred peer-reviewed papers and delivered numerous invited talks in international conferences and colloquia. In March 2020, he has initiated an ad hoc (unfunded) consortium spanning four countries and a dozen hospitals referred to as HEMOCOVID-19 where in collaboration with Dr Jaume Mesquida (project partner TAULI) have identified key potential contributions of near-infrared spectroscopies to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and obtained preliminary data that forms the core of this project.
Marta Zannoletti (PhD) is a post-doc researcher at the Medical Optics group at ICFO. She received her Master’s degree in engineering physics at Politecnico di Milano in 2015. She received her PhD in Physics at the same institute in 2019.
Lorenzo Cortese (PhD) is a post-doc researcher at the Medical Optics group at ICFO since 2016. He obtained his doctorate in 2016 at the European Laboratory for Non-Linear Spectroscopy (LENS) – University of Florence (Italy), dedicated to the fields of micro/nano-photonics, complex photonics systems and bio-inspired photonics. At ICFO, he has worked in several international research projects involving research institutions, clinical institutions and high technology biomedical companies. His work focuses on multi-modal imaging technologies, diffuse correlation spectroscopy and near-infrared spectroscopy, designing and performing experiments in the laboratory and clinics.
Muhammad Atif Yaqub (PhD) is a postdoctoral researcher at the Medical Optics Group at ICFO. He received a BSc and an MSc in electrical engineering from the Center for Advanced Studies in Engineering (Pakistan) in 2008 and the Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia in 2013. He obtained a PhD in mechanical engineering from the Pusan National University (South Korea) in 2021. He has over eight years of academic, research, and industrial experience both at universities and in private companies. His research interests include embedded and wearable system design, fNIRS-based brain imaging, neuromodulation, robotics, and brain-computer interfaces.
Ariadna Martinez (PhD. Project Portfolio Manager) is responsible for IPR management and exploitation of R&D results generated at ICFO, maturing marketable photonic technologies for their applications in Health and Life Sciences. Her expertise includes performing patentability studies, drafting commercialization strategies, raising competitive funding resources and promoting and establishing strategic alliances and collaborations with industry as well as with public institutions. In particular, she is working towards establishing a framework for continuous collaboration between ICFO and its network of hospitals partners in the Barcelona metropolitan area to further promote the latest advances of photonics technologies in the medical sector.
Núria Charles-Harris (Project Manager). Before working in ICFO, Núria Charles-Harris started her career as a Logistics Project manager in a logistics department. She later started to manage International and national projects in Fundació Clínic per la Recerca Biomedica, where she worked for 4 years. She started in ICFO in 2014 in the project unit where she is in charge of international coordinated projects.
Judith Salvador (Project Manager) holds a degree in Economics from the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and a master’s degree in Project Management from IL3-Universitat de Barcelona. She started in ICFO in 2018 in the project unit where she works for European Projects.
Alina Hirschmann (PhD, Science communication officer) obtained her PhD in Astrophysics in 2009 and worked as an associate professor in the Dept. of Physics and Nuclear Engineering (ETSEIB) of the UPC. From 2009 to 2013, she was the communications and outreach manager at the Institut d’Estudis Espacials de Catalunya (IEEC). Since 2013, she is the Science Communicator Officer at ICFO. She has obtained a master’s degree in Communication Management in 2018 and is currently, among other tasks, coordinating the communication actions for the Quantum Flagship CSA project as well as several coordinated projects of the institute.
Marta Martín (Science Communication officer) holds a BSc in Biology from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, an MSc in Neurosciences from the University of Barcelona and a postgraduate degree in Science Communication. She started her career as a researcher in evolutionary biology and animal behaviour. Having communicated and disseminated science both in research institutes and at the university level, in 2020 she joined ICFO as a science communications officer for European Projects.
Politecnico di Milano (PoliMi) is one of the most important universities in Italy and it is well acknowledged in Europe as a technical school for engineering. PoliMi has a leading experience in research projects, boasting 281 founded projects just in FP7, and 347 in the H2020 program. Thanks to a successful long-term collaboration between Dept. of Physics and Dipartimento di Elettronica, Informazione e Bioingegneria, PoliMi carries out research on time-resolved diffuse spectroscopy systems with single-photons sensitivity and picoseconds resolution by pioneering novel technologies (pulsed laser, single-photon detectors, gating electronics). PoliMi is well-known for its worldwide leadership in the development of SPAD (Single-Photon Avalanche Diode) detectors, their associated electronics (e.g. time-to-digital converters) and instrumentation (application-specific detection modules, single-photon imaging cameras, etc.). Finally, PoliMi presents long-lasting expertise in simulations of diffuse optics paradigmatic cases, thus allowing instruments performance validation in novel unexplored applications.
Davide Contini (PhD, Ass. Prof.), Head of the fNIRS lab. He has been an Associate Professor of Physics at Politecnico di Milano since 2014. His research activity is focused on time-resolved spectroscopy of highly diffusive media for applications in biology and medicine. He designed, developed and characterized different systems for the non-invasive measurement of the functional activity in the cerebral and muscular tissues. He participated in several EU funded projects. He co-authored more than 200 publications on international peer-reviewed journals and congress proceedings with an h-index of 31. He is co-founder of PioNIRS srl, Spin-off Company of Politecnico di Milano.
Alessandro Torricelli (PhD, Full Prof.), Head of the fNIRS research line (3 labs). Since 2017 he has been Full Professor in Physics at Politecnico di Milano. His research activity has been focused on the development of innovative time-domain techniques based on pulsed laser for monitoring and imaging biomedical applications. He is co-author of more than 350 publications on international peer-reviewed journals and congress proceedings with an h-index of 51. He is co-founder of PioNIRS srl, Spin-off Company of Politecnico di Milano.
Alberto Tosi (PhD, Ass. Prof.), He has been an Associate Professor of Electronics since 2014 at Politecnico di Milano. He design, develops and exploits silicon, InGaAs/InP and Ge-on-Si Single-Photon Avalanche Diodes (SPADs). He works on arrays of silicon SPADs for 2D and 3D applications, on silicon photomultipliers and on time-correlated single-photon counting electronics. He co-authored more than 250 publications on journals and conference proceedings, plus 3 patents. His current h-index is 37. He is co-founder of PioNIRS srl, Spin-off Company of Politecnico di Milano.
Caterina Amendola, 2nd year PhD student in Physics. Her research activity is focused on the development of hybrid time-domain NIRS and DCS systems.
Lorenzo Frabasile is pursuing a PhD at Politecnico di Milano after receiving his master’s degree in physics engineering. His research mainly deals with pulsed lasers for bio-medical applications, from design to production. In particular, he exploits time-domain NIRS on the brain and muscle to retrieve the tissue hemodynamic.
Corporació Sanitària Parc Taulí (CSPT) is a healthcare public legal entity with the aim of providing high-quality health care to the eastern Catalan region with a population of 420.000 inhabitants. Kept under the leadership of its medical staff, CSPT biomedical research is mainly translational and patient-oriented.
Fundació Parc Taulí (FPT) is an entity created in order to promote and manage the biomedical teaching, training, and research by healthcare professionals from the CSPT. As a strategic objective, FPT provides researchers with facilities for basic research, assistance in search of funds for scientific and medical research, as well as valorizes the technology and research results generated by the CSPT professionals and transfers them to the society by transforming the medical scientific findings into useful products. FPT-CSPT has been recognized as a University Institute affiliated to the Autonomous University of Barcelona and has become a reference in Spain for Health Innovation.
Lluís Blanch (Dr) is a senior Intensivist and Consultant at the Critical Care Center of Hospital de Sabadell in Spain. He is Research and Innovation Director of the Corporació Sanitària Parc Taulí since 2003 and Director of Parc Taulí Research and Innovation Institute since 2015. He attained his Ph.D degree with honours in 1992 and was awarded a Ph.D Special Distinction Degree Prize in 1994. In 1988 he spent a one-year fellowship at the Meakins Christie Laboratories at McGill University of Montreal. In 1998 he spent a sabbatical year as Guest Scholar of the Pulmonary Critical Care Department at Regions Hospital University of Minnesota. Dr. Blanch’s research interests involve translational research on acute lung and brain injury and innovation projects on online monitoring of critically ill patients. He has received numerous grants from public and non-profit organizations. He has been a member of the Executive Committee of The European Society of Intensive Care Medicine, President of the Scientific Committee of the Spanish Society of Critical Care and President of the Catalan Critical Care Society. At present, he is President-Elect of the Spanish Society of Critical Care. Dr. Blanch is a member of the board of several journals and reviewer of the top first quartile journals in the respiratory and critical care fields. Dr. Blanch owns 10% of the Better Care S.L., a spin-off company of Corporació Sanitaria Parc Taulí oriented to integrate and synchronize digital signals from different critical care devices (monitor and ventilators) in order to develop context information and intelligent alarms.
Jaume Mesquida (Dr) is a critical care consultant physician and clinical researcher. He has worked in the ICU of Parc Taulí as an attending physician for more than 15 years, now, and during this period of time, he has combined his clinical research activity. His field of expertise is tissue oxygenation, microcirculation and hemodynamic monitoring in the critically ill patient, with especial relevance of somatic NIRS monitoring in the ICU.
Anna Aguilar (Project Manager) has a degree in Statistics from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, Marketing Management Postgraduate and Project Management training by La Salle Barcelona. She has more than 10 years of experience in project management and she is currently working as a Project Unit Manager in the health sector. She has expertise at the National and International level and she has been involved in several European projects FP7, H2020 and Horizon Europe framework programmes. Her expertise in international project management includes the financial management and auditing of the projects.
Laura Lizama (Innovation Project Manager) is a biomedical engineer with a master’s degree in Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Healthcare. She has worked researching biomedical signals in neuroscience, working on a System of Brain-Computer Interfaces at the Technical University of Graz (Austria). Later, she experienced the full cycle of innovation, assessing different clinical needs, ideating a technological solution and developing the business model with the Biodesign Methodology, created at the University of Stanford. She works as an Innovation Project Manager in the Technology Transfer and Innovation Unit at Parc Tauli Hospital.
HemoPhotonics S.L. emerged as a spin-off in 2013 from the ICFO-Institute of Photonic Sciences, also participant and leading partner of this proposal. We are an SME with the aim to develop (pre-) commercial prototypes and customized photonics instruments based on near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) technologies. The company is located in the Mediterranean Technology Park (Barcelona, Spain) and pursues the goal to translate proven medical optical technologies into commercial products for research-oriented medical and biomedical centres. Our key technologies are based on diffuse near-infrared optical technologies, in particular, diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) and time-domain near-infrared spectroscopy (TRS) for non-invasive measurements of hemodynamic parameters. Last product release was a research series of diffuse optical blood flow monitoring instruments and modules (DCS technology) in 2019. The company employs presently two full-time engineers. We are experts in the DCS instrumentation, a modality part of this proposal, and have been successfully hybridizing this and other optical technologies in complex instruments within several scientific projects.
Dr. Udo M. Weigel received his PhD in experimental physics in 2003 followed by a post-doctoral appointment at the Max-Planck-Institute for Nuclear Physics (GER). As R&D engineer on charged particle optics at ICT/Applied Materials (semiconductor industry) he gained valuable experience fusing his expertise in physics with industrial applications as indicated by joint inventorship in five patents. In 2009, he joined ICFO medical optics group and became in 2013 CEO and co-founder of HemoPhotonics SL.
Dr. Shahrzad Parsa received her PhD in physics at ICFO-The Institute of Photonic Sciences in 2018, specializing in non-linear optics and joined HemoPhotonics in the same year as a research and development engineer for diffuse optical instrumentation.
Splendo is a SME tech company specialized in the internet of things (IoT) apps and artificial intelligence (AI). In twenty years, Splendo gained extensive experience in a wide variety of industries and worked with industry-leading enterprises, large-scale non-profits, and disruptive startups. Eager to commit to new technologies, Splendo specialized in the internet of things (IoT) apps and contributed to the global Bluetooth FTMS standard. Splendo also acquired extensive knowledge in cloud technologies and Artificial Intelligence (AI) which resulted in Splendo’s Time Series AI Platform. In every project (data) security plays an important role; security and privacy are Splendo’s core values and forms part of all development processes at Splendo.
In recent years Splendo worked on several medical and fitness related projects for commercial and non-profit clients. In doing so Splendo gained experience in the medical industry and compliance standards. During the COVID-19 pandemic, these readily available mobile devices have proven essential in low-cost, high volume monitoring and measurements.
Luc Demarteau (CEO) holds a Master of Science Degree in Business Administration from Erasmus University Rotterdam. Twenty years of experience in managing software development projects. Motivating teams with members of different backgrounds and expertises. Team leader of the Splendo Qualcomm Tricorder XPrize team and creator of several innovative products among which SplendoFit.
Tijl Houtbeckers (CTO) holds a degree in Computer Science from HAN University of Applied Sciences. Twenty years of experience in software architecture and development, including mobile applications, scalable cloud backend systems and machine learning, and leading Splendo’s Machine Learning & AI team
Jakub Tomanik (Senior Developer), holds a degree in Telecommunications Engineering from Wroclaw University of Science and Technology. Ten years of app development experience, including numerous medical and fitness projects, among which Babylon Health, and SplendoFit
Tomáš Stanik (UX Designer and Developer), holds a Master of Science Degree in Computer Science from the Technical University of Kosice. UX design and development for several mobile applications, both business and consumer apps including SplendoFit app, Bike Sharing app, and EV charging app.
Eddy Pronk (Electronics and Firmware Developer), holds a degree in Computer Science from Technical University Delft. Extensive experience in firmware development for Garmin, contributed to the Bluetooth FTMS standard, and developed Bluetooth Classic to Bluetooth LE bridging.
Cornelis Boon (Machine Learning Developer), holds a Bachelor Degree in Artificial Intelligence and a Master of Science Degree in Computational Science from the University of Amsterdam. Gained relevant experience through Splendo’s Machine Learning & AI team projects, among which Solar AI and Splendo Time Series. Specialized in data analysis and Machine Learning for Time Seriesdata, similar to data from medical sensor measurements.
Arshad Ashrafi (Senior Backend and Machine Learning Developer), holds a Bachelor Degree in Computer Science from Technical University Delft. Certified in designing and implementing cloud solutions. Extensive experience in medical compliance standards and third-party integrations for medical and fitness applications and devices. Responsible for the backend part of Splendo’s AI team.
BioPixS Ltd (Biophotonics Standards) is a biophotonics optical standards company (https://biopixstandards.com/), a spin-out of university college cork, Ireland. BioPixS ambition is to create standards in the field of biophotonics through innovative phantoms that mimic tissue optical properties. These phantoms will revolutionize across the biophotonics value chain to serve the pressing need of verification/validation of clinical methodologies, characterization, calibration of instruments, standardization of the protocols and devices. BioPixS provides both of the self, customized phantom solutions to customer across the world.
As a testimonial to the research impact of BioPixS, it has recently secured various funding includes, European funded VASCOVID, TinyBrains project, Bank of Ireland deep-dive funds, innovation fund from Enterprise Ireland to expand its global business. In VASCOVID, BioPixS will provide novel phantoms to fast track instrument development by enabling a standardized approach to characterisation/verification, and also provide quality control during the day to day operations of VASCOVID device.
Sanathana Konugolu Venakata Sekar (PhD) is founder and CEO at BioPixS, he received his Ph.D. (cum Laude) in Biomedical optics from Politecnico di Milano (Polimi), Milan, Italy and a recipient of Marie Curie MSCA-ITN fellowship. A deep tech. enthusiast and an aspiring entrepreneur to deliver value through innovation. A team player, had played multiple roles as chair, organizer, moderator, the rapporteur at various international events. He is also a senior researcher at Biophotonics@Tyndall, his former post-doctoral research was in Biomedical optics, in particular, timedomain diffuse optical spectroscopy (TDDOS) applied to phantom and in vivo clinical studies, Time domain diffuse correlation spectroscopy (TDDCS), Time Resolved Raman spectroscopy of diffusive media, and clinical translational research. One of his critical innovation was his invention of Frequency Offset Raman Spectroscopy (FORS), a novel technique to perform deep tissue Raman spectroscopy. A team player, actively collaborated with various institutions (universities, scientific institutions, hospitals, industries) in Biophotonics. His current area of research and interests are UpConverting NanoParticle (UCNPs) for deep tissue imaging and optogenetics applications, GAs in Scattering Media Absorption Spectroscopy (GASMAS) for infant lung vitals monitoring, TDDOS, Raman spectroscopy, instrument development in Biophotonics, Imaging and Non-imaging probe development, entrepreneurial activities in Biophotonics.
Stefan Andersson-Engels (Prof.) is founder and director at BioPixS, an expert in biomedical optics applications, with 30 years’ experience in areas from theoretical modelling of light propagation in tissue to clinical translation and commercial uptake. He is also recruited to the Irish Photonics Integration Centre (IPIC) at Tyndall National Institute and UCC to lead the Bio-Photonics group from heading the biophotonics activity at Lund University. In Lund University he was the director of the Medical Laser Centre and deputy head of Division of Atomic Physics there. His primary reason to join IPIC was to maximize the chances to assist patients in developing biomedical instruments based on photonics, bringing fundamental research to the clinic. His work has so far resulted in three spin-off companies. He has from the role in Lund, collaborated widely with researchers from all across the world. He is a recipient of a Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Research Professorship award and leads through this programme a team of nearly 20 researchers in Tyndall. Professor Andersson-Engels has over 200 peer-reviewed academic publications, has an H index of 65, has 19 patents and has spun out three companies.
Claudia Nunzia Guadagno is a research engineer at BioPixS Ltd. She received her master degree in Physics Engineering in 2016. Her thesis topic was in time-domain diffuse optics for in vivo and phantom application. She formerly worked for different companies and also received a BSc degree in Communication in 2007
Asphalion is a scientific and regulatory affairs consultancy of over 100 people. Asphalion collaborates with Pharma, Biotech and Medical Devices companies facilitating product Development and Regulatory Affairs projects, accumulating more than 1800 projects, and activity in over 50 countries. ASPHALION counts with:
Moreover, ASPHALION supports research consortia as SME Regulatory Expert Partner since 2013, participating in 8 FP7/H2020 projects as a regulatory expert partner. Asphalion main task will be to lead all the regulatory activities during VASCOVID project.
Talyta Carteano (MSc, Project Leader Deputy) is a mechanical engineer with a master in biomedical engineering, with over 10 years’ experience in the medical device field, Talyta combines a technical background with a fulfilling career in regulatory affairs, quality management systems and devices development. Currently, she is Scientific & Regulatory affairs manager at ASPHALION, where she is part of the team focused on quality and regulatory assessment in development and certification of medical devices and in-vitro diagnostics products. Her experience includes the development and implementation of quality management systems in start-up companies, the development and certification of mechanical, active and software medical devices in over 15 countries.
Diego Sanoja García (BSc, Medical Device Officer) is a biomedical engineer, with over 2 years of experience in the medical device field. Diego has a technical background with an up-and-coming career in regulatory relations, quality management systems, and device development. He is currently a Medical Device Officer at ASPHALION, in the team responsible for the quality and regulatory assessment. He has advised companies in their process of obtaining a CE Marking, FDA approval and other regulatory requirements. His work has centered around having developed quality management systems in start-up enterprises, as well as actively working in the certification of mechanical, active, and software medical devices in over nine countries.
pioNIRS s.r.l. was founded in 2020 as Spin-Off company of Politecnico di Milano with the aim of developing and commercializing innovative instrumentation and techniques for Time-Domain Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (TD-NIRS). With its strong scientific background and continuative collaboration with universities and research institutions, pioNIRS is able to provide state-of-art technologies using light to non-invasively investigate the internal properties of biological tissues and samples. Custom-made pulsed laser sources, wide-area ultra-sensitive photodetectors and extremely precise acquisition electronics allow our devices to successfully improve measurement quality in several applications, ranging from biomedicine, healthcare, food and material quality control.
Mauro Buttafava (Ph.D.) is co-founder and CEO at pioNIRS, he received the M.Sc. degree in Electronics Engineering and the Ph.D. degree in Information Technology from the Politecnico di Milano in 2013 and 2017, respectively. His technical expertise involves design and characterization of time-resolved, gated-mode single-photon counting systems, with different applications in research, industrial and biomedical fields: optical spectroscopy, time-of-flight imaging and fluorescence microscopy. He is co-author of more than 50 publications on journals and conference proceedings and 2 patents.
Michele Lacerenza (Ph.D. Student) is co-founder and CTO at pioNIRS, he received his M.Sc. in Physics Engineering, Nano-Optics and Photonics from Politecnico di Milano in 2018 and is now pursuing a Ph.D. at the same institute. His expertise involves hardware and software development for compact, wearable Time-Domain Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (TD-NIRS) systems, with applications on brain and tissue hemodynamic analysis. His backpack is filled with international experience, he worked in various countries including US, UK, Europe, and South America. In the last 3 years, he has been co-author of 12 scientific publications, and he participated in more than 10 international conferences as both speaker and moderator.
David Busch, Assistant Professor U. Texas Southwestern on behalf of HEMOCOVID-19 consortium steering committee;
Valentin Fuster, Director of Mount Sinai Heart and Physician-in-Chief of The Mount Sinai Hospital;
Ricard Ferrer, Chair of the Sociedad Española de Medicina Intensiva Critica Y Unidades Coronarias (SEMICYUC);
Joan Ramon Masclans, Head of the Critical Care Unit at Hospital del Mar.
“This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101016087″
