The webinar series was jointly organised by Early-Stage Researchers of ONTOX, VHP4Safety and the ASPIS Academy. Across five webinars, the series explored key themes shaping the future of animal-free chemical safety, including research output management strategies for animal-free risk assessment, stakeholder engagement and science–society dialogue, (q)AOPs and data-driven models for human-relevant toxicology, the ONTOX and VHP4Safety IT platforms, and strategies for next-generation risk assessment.
Looking back: recordings from webinars
All webinars can be watched below or on the ONTOX YouTube channel.
The fifth webinar
Titled “Strategies for Next-generation Risk Assessment in ONTOX and VHP4Safety,” the webinar provided insights into NGRA from the ONTOX and VHP4Safety perspectives.
Attendees gathered knowledge from these presenting experts:
- Trine Husøy (Norwegian Institute of Public Health – NIPH | ONTOX)
- Susana Proença (ESQlabs | ONTOX)
- Julen Sanz Serrano (Vrije Universiteit Brussel | ONTOX)
- Fabian Wagenaars (TNO | VHP4Safety)
The fourth webinar
Titled “Exploring the ONTOX and VHP4Safety IT platforms“, the webinar provided an in-depth look at the digital tools developed to support next-generation chemical safety assessment.
Three researchers from the respective projects shared their insights and experiences with the platforms:
- Jörg Marusczyk (ONTOX)
- Ozan Cinar (VHP4Safety)
The third webinar
The webinar “(q)AOPs: Advancing Human-relevant Toxicology Through Data-driven Models“, explored how Early-Stage Researchers in VHP4Safety and ONTOX are advancing Adverse Outcome Pathways to bridge mechanistic science and chemical risk assessment.
Attendees had the opportunity to dive deep into the topic alongside experts:
- Marvin Martens (VHP4Safety)
- Nathalie Dierichs (VHP4Safety)
- David Poole (VHP4Safety)
- Annika Drees (ONTOX )
The second webinar
The webinar “Bridging Science and Society: Stakeholder Involvement in Animal-Free Risk Assessment” highlighted the vital role of stakeholder engagement in initiatives such as ASPIS and ONTOX.
“Effective stakeholder management is the key to successfully transitioning to animal-free risk assessment. This webinar presented how this is handled in ONTOX and VHP4Safety, and participants welcomed the opportunity to dive deeper into the topic with our experts,” commented Marie Corradi, event co-organiser on behalf of ONTOX.
During the webinar, esteemed experts shared how collaborative efforts between researchers, regulators, and industry can facilitate the transition to innovative, non-animal methodologies.
The webinar featured presentations from:
- Michael Guy Diemar (ONTOX)
- Aniek de Winter (VHP4Safety)
- Isaac Ortega Alvarado (VHP4Safety)
The first webinar
The inaugural webinar, “Research Output Management Strategies for Animal-Free Risk Assessment,” featured:
- Danyel Jennen (VHP4Safety; ONTOX)
- Marcha Verheijen (ONTOX)
- Eliska Kuchovska (ONTOX; ASPIS Academy)
- Jente Houweling (VHP4Safety)
Speakers introduced BioStudies and the ToxTempAssistant, showcasing their implementation within ONTOX and VHP4Safety.
A collaborative webinar series
Online sessions were part of an ONTOX-VHP4Safety webinar series, organised in collaboration with the ASPIS Academy, a network of Early-Stage Researchers (ESRs). The series aimed to showcase the contributions of ESRs from ONTOX and VHP4Safety while reinforcing the collaboration between the two projects.
On 12 February 2024, ONTOX and VHP4Safety formalised their cooperation by signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). This agreement fosters collaboration on various initiatives, including the webinar series, to accelerate the transition towards functional chemical risk assessment without animal testing.
About the VHP4Safety
The mission of the Virtual Human Platform for Safety Assessment (VHP4Safety) is to improve the prediction of the potentially harmful effects of chemicals and pharmaceuticals based on a holistic, interdisciplinary definition of human health by developing the Virtual Human Platform and accelerating the transition from animal-based testing to innovative safety assessment.
The Virtual Human Platform integrates data on human physiology, chemical characteristics and perturbations of biological pathways for the first time in an inclusive and integrated manner that incorporates:
- human-relevant scenarios to discriminate vulnerable groups, such as disease state, life course exposure, gender and age;
- chemicals from different sectors: pharma, consumer products and chemical industry;
- different regulatory and stakeholder needs.
About the ASPIS Academy
The ASPIS Academy is a network for ESRs interested in developing and using New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) in toxicology. ASPIS Academy boosts the careers of ESRs by providing targeted training and creating a space where the excellent ideas and dreams of a young scientist’s generation can shine.
ASPIS Academy is part of the ASPIS cluster, a collaboration of the H2020-funded projects ONTOX, PrecisionTox, and RISK-HUNT3R, representing Europe’s effort towards the sustainable, animal-free and reliable chemical risk assessment of tomorrow.