The Master's Degree in R&D in Biotechnology and Biomedicine was opened last Friday, October 3rd. The opening lecture was given by José Miguel Mulet Salort, researcher, writer, and science communicator. Full professor in the Department of Biotechnology at the Polytechnic University of Valencia, he leads a line of research at the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biology of Plants (IBMCP) that seeks to develop drought- and cold-tolerant plants. During his talk ("What is a Biotechnologist for?"), he offered interesting reflections on the origin and development of biotechnology, as well as some key moments in modern biotechnology, including gene editing techniques (CRISPR). He spoke about gene-edited foods, a technology that has already reached our tables, and offered an interesting final reflection: "How many things we use throughout the day are due to biotechnology that we hadn't realized?"

In the first class of the course "Case Studies in Biotechnology Companies", Daniel Ramón (ADM Biopolis) raised the main challenges food biotechnology must address in the future. The first of them is hunger, but also the obesity pandemic, the inversion of the population pyramid, climate change, the water footprint of agriculture, demographic change, and consumer trends.