SciCom

The introduction of a new award category, the ECCO Global Grant, at the 19th Congress of ECCO in 2024, represented an exciting step forward in addressing knowledge gaps and unmet needs relevant to low and lower-middle income countries (LMICs). The intention was to promote research partnerships between institutions in ECCO Member Countries and institutions in LMICs in order to strengthen the global network of ECCO while delivering top class international research.

Congratulations to the winners of the ECCO Fellowships and Grants awarded at the ECCO Congress 2026 in Stockholm! As part of its continued commitment to advancing IBD research, ECCO announced that its investment in research and travel grants would rise to EUR 2.5 million, with the result that a second Pioneer Award and five more ECCO Research Grants were awarded.

At ECCO’26 in Stockholm, Isabelle Cleynen (Belgium) stepped down from the ECCO Scientific Committee. An associate professor at KU Leuven and leader of the Lab for Complex Genetics within the Department of Human Genetics, Isabelle joined SciCom in February 2022 and served as Chair for two years (February 2024–2026). She worked closely with the committee and the ECCO Office to support improvements to the Fellowships and Grants reviewer process and to galvanise ECCO’s reviewer community in response to an increasing number of funding applications.

The Scientific Committee of ECCO (SciCom) was one of the first committees created at ECCO and now, almost 60 committee meetings later, its core mission remains to link basic and translational research to the clinical parameters of IBD in order to achieve better therapeutic management and improved long-term outcomes for patients.

In May 2025, SciCom, together with Y-ECCO, co-hosted the first ever ECCO Webinar offering skills training for early career IBD Physicians (with CME points*) on a range of research techniques, including such relevant topics as transcriptomics, genetics and epigenetics and the microbiome. The skills-building series was conceived by Bella Ungar, who, together with Bram Verstockt, the former Chair of Y-ECCO, built a programme to meet the e-learning materials gap in translational science for clinicians.

In June 2023, SciCom selected a joint proposal from Shaji Sebastian (then a ClinCom Member, now a Governing Board Member) and the H-ECCO Chair, Aart Mookhoek, addressing the present and future directions of artificial intelligence (AI) in IBD at the frontiers of imaging (endoscopy, radiology, histology), big data, predictive models, drug discovery and both ethical and regulatory considerations.

Diet is now widely recognised to be a significant factor in the pathogenesis of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD). The optimal role of diet in managing IBD remains an area of ongoing investigation. Diet has thus emerged as a ‘hot topic’ within the field of IBD, and it will take centre stage at the 13th SciCom Workshop.

My son loves the thrilling evolution of Pokémon creatures into their more advanced form. The suspense surrounding the ECCO Young Researcher Award mirrors this Pokémon transformation, as emerging researchers in our community are recognised for their own distinguished professional growth.

ECCO is proud of its continuing commitment to support innovative IBD research through its Fellowships, Grants and Travel Awards, including our flagship Pioneer Awards. Our grant programme now extends beyond the borders of Europe with the emergence of our new Global Grant supporting IBD research for low and lower-middle income countries.

The first ECCO Global Grant was awarded at ECCO'24 to an international group leading a fascinating prospective study across Sub-Saharan Africa1. The study is focusing on IBD genetics in the region and is being led by Professor Nick Croft and Dr. Phoebe Hodges from Queen Mary University of London, Professor Paul Kelly and colleagues from the Tropical Gastroenterology and Nutrition Group, University of Zambia and Professor McGovern and his group at Cedars-Sinai, Los Angeles. I had the privilege of discussing aspects of the study with members of the study consortium.

At ECCO’24, Stockholm, the winners of the ECCO Fellowships and Grants programme received their certificates, presented by SciCom Chair Marc Ferrante together with President Britta Siegmund. This year, a record number of grants were awarded, including the new Global Grant designed for low and lower-middle income countries as well as the IIS Registry Grant given for the first time.

At the last ECCO Congress, we had three members stepping down from the ECCO Scientific Committee: Marc Ferrante (Leuven, Belgium; Member since 2019, Chair since 2023), Yves Panis (Clichy, France; Member since 2020) and Konstantinos Papamichail (Boston, US; Member since 2020). Although all three of them served on SciCom in a period greatly impacted by the pandemic, together with the other SciCom Members they ensured a seamless continuation of SciCom activities and the initiation of new ones.