Partner 1, Centre for Ethics in Medicine, University of Bristol
The Centre for Ethics in Medicine was founded in 1998, and has become a highly reputable establishment of international importance in the area of medical ethics. It has been at the forefront of academic research and was responsible for the organisation of the International Association of Bioethics' (IAB) 5th World Congress of Bioethics in 2000. The Centre has academic contacts at a high level throughout the world; has taken part in numerous international and national multidisciplinary fora and collaborative research projects in medical ethics and related fields; and has an exceptional teaching reputation within the University of Bristol. The Centre is at the forefront of innovative research, and enjoys the input of cross-disciplinary academics in its research and teaching. Recent grants from the Wellcome Trust have dealt with stem cell research, research in neurosurgery, research ethics relating to children, and legislation regarding human tissue. The Centre's Director, Professor Campbell, was the co-ordinator of a major European Commission grant under the Biomed II Programme (Contract No: BMH4-98-3112) on "The Relevance of Virtue Ethics to Patients with Chronic Illness". Of particular relevance is the Centre's existing research experience and capacities, and its involvement in national and Europe-wide networks, meetings and research collaborations. In addition, the Centre has extensive in-house interdisciplinary expertise encompassing ethics in medicine, philosophy, law, and social science.
Prof. Ruud ter Meulen (1952) is Director of Centre for Ethics in Medicine at Bristol University. He is psychologist and ethicist. He was Director of the Institute for Bioethics and Professor for Philosophy and Ethics at the University of Maastricht (1995-2005. The main research areas of Prof. ter Meulen are Justice in health care, ethics of research, medical ethics committees, ethical pluralism and the problem of consensus. Prof. ter Meulen has directed several international projects, including the BIOMED 2 project 'Solidarity and care in the European Union' (1998-2000). And the EU Fifth Framework project 'Ethical Issues of Evidence Based Practice in Medicine and Health Care' (EVIBASE). He was partner f the Project Bio-Technology-Ethics, coordinated by the University of Genoa (Prof. Celada), and is involved as a partner in the BIOTETHED project which is the successor to the Bio-T-Ethics project. He is member of the Advisory Group of the Science and Society programme of the European Commission. Prof. ter Meulen will be responsible for the over-all coordination of the project (WP 1), Final Meeting (WP 6) and Reporting (WP 8) and will be involved in Work package 3 coordinated by University of Maastricht.
Professor Alastair Campbell is Professor Emeritus of Ethics in Medicine in the School of Medicine, University of Bristol and former Director of the Centre for Ethics in Medicine. He is a former President of the International Association of Bioethics. Recent publications include Health as Liberation (Pilgrim Press, 1995) and Medical Ethics, co-authored with Max Charlesworth, Grant Gillett and Gareth Jones (Oxford University Press, 2001). Professor Campbell is a member of the Medical Ethics Committee of the British Medical Association. Until recently, Professor Campbell was Chairman of the Wellcome Trust's Standing Advisory Group on Ethics and Vice-chairman of the Retained Organs Commission. He is currently Chairman of the UK Biobank's Ethics and Governance Council.
David Nutt DM, FRCP, FRCPsych, FmedSci, is currently Professor of Psychopharmacology and Head of the Department of Community Based Medicine at the University of Bristol. He received his undergraduate training in medicine at Cambridge and Guy's Hospital, and continued training in neurology to MRCP. After completing his psychiatric training in Oxford, he continued there as a lecturer and then later as a Wellcome Senior Fellow in psychiatry. He then spent two years as Chief of the Section of Clinical Science in the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in NIH, Bethesda, USA. On returning to England in 1988 he set up the Psychopharmacology Unit in Bristol, an interdisciplinary research grouping spanning the departments of Psychiatry and Pharmacology. Their main research interests are in the brain mechanisms underlying anxiety, depression and addiction and the mode of action of therapeutic drugs. He is currently a member of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD), and Chair of its Technical Committee, a member of the Committee on Safety of Medicines (CSM), on the Council and President-Elect of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) and a Director of the 'European Certificate in Anxiety and Mood Disorders' and the 'Masters in Affective Disorders' Courses jointly administered by the Universities of Maastrict, Bristol and Florence. In addition, he is the Editor of the Journal of Psychopharmacology, advisor to the British National Formulary and a Past-President of the British Association of Psychopharmacology (BAP). He was also a member of the Independent Inquiry into the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, chaired by Viscountess Runciman that reported in 2000.
Lisbeth W. Nielsen is research assistant at Centre for Ethics in Medicine, University of Bristol. She has a Master Degree in theology from the University of Copenhagen (2001). She is currently finishing a Ph.D. in ethics on the topic ‘The concept of nature and its role in ethical debate on new gene technologies. Lisbeth represented the Centre for Ethics and Law, Copenhagen, in the EU funded project Bio-T-Ethics (2002-2005) and will continuously be the Danish representative in the BIOTETHED project which is the successor of the previously mentioned project.
As research assistant in the ENHANCE project, Lisbeth will be assisting in the coordination (WP1), and further more contribute to the research on mood enhancement in WP3, which is coordinated by University of Maastricht.
Partner 2: Center for Practical Ethics, University of Oxford, United Kingdom
The Oxford group will be coordinated from the Oxford Uehiro Center for Practical Ethics, which is part of the Oxford University Philosophy Faculty. The Center has a strong research focus on the ethics of human enhancement medicine and related technological and social issues. The members of the Oxford team overlap in their scientific and ethical expertise, i.e. the team doesn't just consist of some scientists and some ethicists, but all three principal investigators have competence both areas, and all have a clear specialization and have published extensively on issues relating to human enhancement. Additionally, all three have very extensive experience with involving and communicating to a wider popular audience (they have made an estimated total of 500 media appearances, and each has organized several conferences and given numerous public lectures). In addition to the three principal investigators, the Centre benefits from visiting scholars and from its affiliated researchers, which include Prof. John Brook (science and religion), Prof. John Broom (ethics and economics), Dr. Roger Crisp (ethics), Tony Hope (medical ethics), Dr. Ainsley Newson (ethics of cognitive enhancement), Derek Parfit (ethics), and others. The Centre also maintains close collaborations with the James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization (Oxford), the Centre for Human Values (Princeton), the Oxford Centre for Ethics and Communication in Health Care Practice, and the Ian Ramsey Centre (Oxford). These resources create an outstanding platform for interdisciplinary work on the ethics of human enhancement.
Professor Julian Savulescu
Prof. Savulescu is Director for the Oxford Center for Practical Ethics. He is qualified in medicine, bioethics, and analytic philosophy. His areas of expertise include the ethics of genetic engineering, especially genetic enhancement, medical ethics, end-of-life decisions, sports ethics, and resource allocation. He has published two monographs and over 100 journal articles.
Nick Bostrom is the director of the
Future of Humanity Institute at
Oxford University. He previously taught in the Faculty of Philosophy and
in the Institute for Social and Policy Studies at Yale University. He is
also a former British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow.
Bostrom has published more than 100 articles, including papers in
journals such as Nature, Journal of Philosophy,
Bioethics, Mind, Journal of Medical Ethics, and
Astrophysics & Space Science. He is the author of one
monograph, Anthropic Bias (Routledge), and the co-editor of two
forthcoming volumes with Oxford University Press: one on global
catastrophic risk, the other on the ethics of human enhancement. His
writings have been translated into 15 different languages.
Bostrom is a leading expert on the consequences and ethics of human
enhancement and other emerging technologies. His research also covers the
foundations of probability theory, scientific methodology, and risk
analysis. Bostrom has a background in physics and computational
neuroscience as well as in philosophy.
Dr. Bostrom is a frequently sough-after commentator in the media, and he
has done nearly 200 interviews for television, radio, and print
media.
Dr. Sandberg is a member of the SANS (Studies in Artificial Neural Systems) research group at Stockholm University/Royal Institute of Technology. He is also co-founder and science director of the Eudoxa think tank and neuroscience expert in the "Se Hjärnan!" collaboration between the Swedish Science Council and Swedish Travelling Exhibitions (a project exploring public participation and debate in neuroscience). His thesis (2003) explored the use of artificial neural networks as models of human memory, especially the effects of changing the learning rate. His research interests are primarily in cognitive and computational neuroscience, especially methods of cognitive enhancement and their philosophical and social consequences. He is both interested in direct biological enhancement and external systems such as adaptive software, information visualisation and intimate computing. He has written extensively about new technologies and how they might impact organisations, humanistic values and human rights.
Partner 3: Stockholm Bioethics Centre, University of Stockholm
Stockholm Bioethics Centre consists of four researchers at the Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University: Torbjörn Tännsjö, Gustaf Arrhenius, Ulrik Kihlbom, and Åsa Carlson. Arrhenius, Carlson, Kihlbom and Tännsjö are all experts in the fields of moral philosophy and applied ethics. In particular, Tännsjö is an expert in sport philosophy and Arrhenius is an expert in duties to future generation and question concerning quality of life and life span extension. The centre also has a group of associated Research Fellows. These are Anders Sandberg (Royal Institute of Technology), an expert in cognitive and computational neuroscience, especially methods of cognitive enhancement; Bengt Brülde (Göteborg), specialised in clinical ethics, Claudio M. Tamburrini (Göteborg), specialised in the philosophy of sport, and Krister Bykvist (Oxford), specialised in desire theory. Stockholm Bioethics Centre has developed an extensive international network, mainly through Tännsjö's and Arrhenius's personal contacts. Tännsjö is member of the editorial boards of journals such as Bioethics and Monash Bioethics Review and of the editorial board of Kluwer's series on applied ethics. The department is regularly visited by prominent bioethicists in the philosophical tradition such as Jonathan Glover, Dan W. Brock, Helga Kuhse, Peter Singer, Julian Savulescu.
Professor Arrheniusis a Research Fellow in Practical Philosophy at Stockholm University since January 2003 and a Senior Lecturer since July 2004 (on leave). He received his Ph.D. in philosophy from University of Toronto and his FD in practical philosophy from Uppsala University. Arrhenius research interests are primarily in moral and political philosophy, and he's especially interested in issues in the intersection between moral and political philosophy and the medical and social sciences (e.g., economics, law, and political science). He has written extensively on our moral obligations to future generations, applying the methods of social choice and game theory. His dissertation, Future Generations: A Challenge for Moral Theory, sums up the last decades discussions about population ethics in an almost definitive manner. He has also published extensively on these issues in leading international journals such as Utilitas, Economics and Philosophy, Philosophical Studies, etc., and he has presented papers in bioethics at numerous international conferences, many times as an invited speaker..
Torbjörn Tännsjö is Claëson Professor of Practical Philosophy at
Stockholm University and head of Stockholm Bioethics Centre, he has
written and published extensively on problems in bioethics, both in
Sweden and internationally. He has published on genetic enhancement in
general and he is working within the field of genetic enhancement in
sport in particular. Important publications are Torbjörn Tännsjö and
Claudio M. Tamburrini (eds.), Values in Sport (London and New York:
Routledge, 1999) and Claudio M. Tamburrini and Torbjörn Tännsjö (eds.)
Gene Technology and Sport (London and New York: Routledge, 2005). Other
recent books by Tännsjö are Understanding Ethics (Edinburgh: Edinburgh
UP/Columbia UP, 2002), Terminal Sedation: Euthanasia in Disguise
(Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2005), and The Repugnant Conclusion (with Jesper
Ryberg, eds.), (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2005).
Claudio M. Tamburrini
Claudio M. Tamburrini is a Senior Researcher at the Stockholm Bioethics Centre, Department of Philosophy, Stockholm University, Sweden. He is the author of
Crime and Punishment? (Acta Universitatis Stockholmiensis, 1992, reprinted in 1993 and 1996 by Akademitryck AB, Edsbruk) and of several international articles on penal philosophy. In the area of the philosophy of sports, Tamburrini has published
The “Hand of God”? – Essays in the Philosophy of Sports (Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis, 2000), which has also been translated to Spanish. Both in Sweden and in Argentina, Tamburrini has accomplished a pioneering work in introducing the philosophy of sports as an academic discipline. During the last years, Tamburrini has performed research and published articles on bioethical issues, particularly gene technology. Together with Torbjön Tännsjö, he is the co-editor of
Values in Sport – Elitism, Nationalism, Gender Equality and the Scientific Manufacture of Winners (London and New York, E & FN Spon, 2000), and
Genetic technology and sport – Ethical questions (London and New York, Routledge, 2005). He has also published articles on moral relativism and its implications for the punishment of human rights violators. Tamburrini was also a professional soccer player in Argentina.
Partner 4: Universita Vita Salute - San Raffaele, Milan
Partner 4 Research Team is composed of experts in bioethics and biotechnology. Prof. Massimo Reichlin, Prof. Roberto Mordacci, and Dr. Roberta Sala are scholars in the fields of bioethics, moral philosophy and political philosophy. Their research activity focus on the ethical and philosophical issues arising from technologies in medicine and biology. They are experienced in EU research projects dealing with ethics and bioethics. Prof. Angelo Vescovi is an expert scientist and researcher in the field of neural stem cells, neural mechanism of biological aging and genetic therapies. Dr. Gaia Barazzetti is a young researcher trained in ethics and skilled in EU projects concerning biomedical ethics.
Prof. Massimo Reichlin (PhD)
Associate Professor of Moral Philosophy at the Faculty of Philosophy, University Vita-Salute San Raffaele, Milan. He is the principal investigator in the Enhance Project for Partner 4. He is graduated in philosophy, specialised in bioethics, and he defended his doctoral thesis in bioethics. His research activity includes three main lines of development: research in the field of bioethics, with reference to normative theories and epistemic paradigms used in this field, as well as to specific ethical issues, such as euthanasia and assisted suicide, the status of the human embryo and reproductive technologies, and animal rights; research on the main issues in contemporary ethical theory. He teaches Bioethics (Faculty of Medicine) and Ethics of Life (Faculty of Philosophy) at University Vita-Salute San Raffaele. He is a member of the Ethics Committee and of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) of the Scientific Institute H San Raffaele.
Associate Professor of Moral Philosophy at the Faculty of Philosophy, University Vita-Salute San Raffaele, Milan. He is graduated in philosophy, specialised in bioethics, and he defended his doctoral thesis in bioethics. His main research topics are: the concepts of health and illness, the nature and goals of medical practice, methodology of argumentation in bioethics, the notion of person, human experimentation, personal identity and genetic identity, genetics, gene therapy, informed consent, euthanasia, ethics committees. He was the local leader of the international project on EU funding Teaching Ethics: Materials for Practitioners Education (TEMPE), Fifth Framework Programme, coordinated by D. Dickinson. He teaches Bioethics (Faculty of Medicine, Academic Course in Biotechnology) and Moral Philosophy (Faculty of Philosophy) at University Vita-Salute San Raffaele.
Researcher in Political Philosophy at the Faculty of Philosophy, University Vita-Salute San Raffaele, Milan. She is graduated in philosophy, specialised in bioethics, and she defended her doctoral thesis in bioethics. She is a researcher in the fields of bioethics, political philosophy and nursing ethics. Her research interests include: ethical aspects of organ transplants, ethical and political issues concerning abortion and new reproductive technologies, multiculturalism and toleration, feminist ethics, and the political thought of John Locke. She was the local leader of the international project on EU funding Ethical Codes in Nursing (ECN), Fifth Framework Programme (Quality of Life and Management of Living Resources), directed by University of Maastricht, Netherlands. She teaches Bioethics (Faculty of Psychology), Political philosophy (Faculty of Philosophy), and Nursing Ethics (Faculty of Medicine, Nursing Academic Course) at University Vita-Salute San Raffaele.
Dr. Angelo Vescovi (PhD)
Co-Director of Research of the "Institute for Stem Cell Research", Hospital San Raffaele, Milan. He is an expert scientist and researcher in the field of neural stem cells. He was supervisor of the projects of the Italian Ministry of Health: "Unlimited culturing and banking of multipotential stem cells of the human central nervous system" (1993-1996), and "Autologous transplantation for the therapy of Parkinson's disease" (1996-1999). From 1995 to 1998 he was Vice-Director of Research Neurospheres Ltd., Department of Pathology, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. In 2000 he was coordinator of the national projects of the Ministry of Health: "Neural stem cells and gene therapy for the cure of Alzheimer's Disease" and "Characterization and plasticity of somatic stem cells for the therapy of human diseases". He is Associate Professor of Cell Biology at the Department of Biotechnology and Bioscience, University of Milano Bicocca, Milan.
Gaia Barazzetti is graduated in philosophy, specialised in bioethics and she obtained a Diplôme d'Etudes Approfondies (DEA) in Philosophy. Her research interests focus on specific ethical and philosophical issues arising from advances in biotechnology and medicine, such as the concept of person in end-of-life care, the notion of autonomy in bioethics, ethical codes of health professions. She worked as researcher within the international project on EU funding Ethical Codes in Nursing (ECN), Fifth Framework Programme (Quality of Life and Management of Living Resources), directed by University of Maastricht, Netherlands. She will execute all research activities of Enhance Project that are under the responsibility of Partner 4.
Partner 5: Institute for Bioethics, University of Maastricht, The Netherlands
The Institute for Bioethics (Instituut voor Gezondheidsethiek, IGE) was founded in 1984 in Maastricht as an independent organization for research, training and consultancy in the field of bioethics. The Institute merged with the University of Maastricht in 2002. The Institute remains active as a project group, focused on the international and national projects in bioethics. The IGE has coordinated many international, European projects in various areas of bioethics and has built a strong reputation in this field.. The main fields of expertise include the ethics of genetic technologies (Prof. De Wert), the ethics of mental health care (Dr. R. Berghmans) The Institute collaborates with researchers of the Department of Health Ethics and of the Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Health Sciences and of the Academic Hospital of Maastricht. The IGE will coordinate this project and will be responsible for the work package on the enhancement of mood. As already indicated, the IGE has a long standing reputation in coordinating European projects and has a broad ethical expertise in various fields of biotechnology and its application in health care settings (including, mental health care, elderly and geriatric care, clinical genetics). Dr. Berghmans will be responsible for technologies in the field of mood enhancement (WP3) and will collaborate in the workpackage on cognitive enhancement (WP2) technologies. Prof. De Wert will collaborate on issues of genetics and mood enhancement, Dr. Van Hilvoorde will work on the ethical and philosophical aspects of mood enhancement in a general sense and will cooperate with researchers in the workpackage on enhancement in sport (WP4). Prof. Steinbusch is a leading expert in the field of neurosciences. He will collaborate as a scientific expert in the work package dealing with cognitive enhancement (WP2) and the work package dealing with mood enhancement (WP3).
Ron Berghmans PhD
Dr Ron L.P. Berghmans is a psychologist and ethicist who has a special interest in the field of ethics and mental health care. His PhD thesis (1992) concerned moral issues related to paternalism and coercive treatment in psychiatry. He has been and continues to be involved in several research projects in the fields of psychiatry and psychogeriatrics in the Netherlands, and in a number of European projects in psychiatry and care for the cognitively impaired elderly. He has coordinated the BIOMED-2 project on 'Ethical guidelines on the use of human embryonic and fetal tissue transplantation.' and the Framework 5 project Ethicists and Psychiatrists Collaborating on Capacity. (EPICC) Dr. Berghmans will take primary responsibility for the work-package on the ethical issues of mood enhancement (WP 3)
Guido de Wert (1959) studied ethics/theology at Radboud University of Nijmegen, The Netherlands (1984, cum laude). Since 2002, he is professor in Biomedical Ethics at Maastricht University, The Netherlands. His former functions include: senior research fellow at the Institute for Bioethics, Maastricht (1984-2001), secretary of the Health Council of the Netherlands, The Hague (1987-1989), and associate professor in medical ethics at the Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR, 1995-1999). In 1999, he defended his thesis 'Looking ahead. Reproductive technologies, genetics and ethics' at the Erasmus University Rotterdam (cum laude). Guido de Wert is Crown-appointed member of the Health Council of the Netherlands, member of both the Council's Standing Committee on Medical Ethics and Health Law and the Standing Committee on Genetics, member of the Ethics Committee of International Stem Cell Forum, and member of the Ethics Task Force of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology. The main topics of his research interest concern the ethics of (clinical, community and behavioral) genetics, reproductive medicine, and transplantation medicine.
Professor Rein Vos
Prof. Rein Vos (1955) studied medicine (1973-1983) and philosophy (1979-86 cum laude) in Groningen. PhDThesis: Drugs Looking for Diseases, University of Groningen, 1989. Dr. Vos has been a staffmember of the Dept. Of Social Pharmacy, University of Groningen (1983-1998), and Professor (bijzonder hoogleraar) of History of Pharmacy, University of Groningen (1995-2000). Since 1998, Dr. Vos is Professor of Theory of Health Sciences and Chair of the Dept. Of Health Ethics and Philosophy of the Faculty of Health Sciences of the University of Maastricht. Prof. Vos has been visiting professor, Centre for Medical Ethics, University of Oslo, 1990, visiting professor, Center for Philosophy of Science Pittsburgh, 1991. Prof Vos has been Director Program Social Pharmacy & Pharmacoepidemiology, and Co-ordinator Research Division Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Policy of the Groningen Institute for Drug Studies (GIDS), 1993-1998, Member Directory Board Dutch Association for the Pharmaceutical Sciences, section Drug Utilization Studies and Pharmaco-epidemiology, 1997-1998. He has been supervisor of several PhD-projects, post-doc and research assistants. He is a Member of the board of Theoretical Medicine, section Logic and Epistemiology of Medicine. Prof. Vos is currently coordinator of several projects on the role of genetics in society (nutrigenomics, genomics in sport etc.) sponsored by NWO (Dutch National Organisation of Research).
Prof. Harry Steinbusch MD
Prof. Harry Steinbusch is neuroscientist and Director of the European Graduate School of Neuroscience (EURON) with eleven universities in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. He is Director of the Maastricht Institute Brain & Behaviour and Division leader of one of the three divisions within the Maastricht Institute of "Brain and Behavior". At Maastricht University there are four research institutes i.e. "Cardiovascular System", "Extra", "Nutrition and Environment" and "Brain and Behaviour". Each institute is divided in a clinical and biomedical/preclinical division. Within each division several faculty as well as clinical departments participate. Division III: "Neurodegeneration and Plasticity" receives input from the department of Psychiatry & Neuropsychology, Neurology, Molecular Cell Biology & Genetics, Pediatrics/Neonatology, Neurosurgery, Anesthesiology, Otolaryngology, Neuropathology and Ophthalmology. Prof. Steinbusch is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of chemical neuroanantomy, Chairman of the Steering Committee of NENS (Network of European Neuroscience Schools, 82 Neuroscience Graduate School in Europe with 2.800 Ph.D. Students), Scientific Director of the International Alzheimer Foundation in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Vice-chairman of the educational committee of the CNIP, Member programme committee of FENS (Federation of European Neuroscience Schools) and European candidate for president of IBRO
Ivo van Hilvoorde PhD
Dr. Ivo van Hilvoorde is postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Health care ethics and philosophy, Maastricht University, The Netherlands. He has worked and published in the fields of sport philosophy, educational science and medical ethics. He is currently working on two research projects. One research is concerned with ethical issues surrounding the several (potential) applications of gene technology in sport (ranging form prevention, selection to therapeutic and enhancement). The other project (employed by the Mulier Institute, Centre for Research in Sports in Society) is a social-historical research on the emergence and diffusion of fitness practices, fitness equipment and the construction of norms and ideals for the fit and sportive body.