An ERC PoC awarded to Nicola Elvassore to facilitate the production of organoids

There is also the project by Nicola Elvassore, professor at the University of Padua and scientific director of VIMM, among the 18 Italian projects selected under the first 2026 call, through which 182 ERC Proof of Concept (PoC) grants were awarded, for a total value of 27.3 million euros. Each grant amounts to 150,000 euros and supports current and recent ERC grantees in exploring the commercial or social potential of their research results. 

Funding for Elvassore was awarded for the development of the FAR-O project (Fully Automated Reprogramming and Organoid Production), an automated platform for organoid production.

The FAR-O project builds on the results achieved within the framework of the ERC Advanced Grant REPROIDS, awarded to Nicola Elvassore in 2022, and addresses one of the main challenges currently limiting the use of organoids in biomedical research: the difficulty of producing them rapidly, in a standardized way, and at large scale.

Organoids are three-dimensional models derived from human cells that reproduce in the laboratory some fundamental characteristics of organs and tissues. In recent years, they have become established as essential tools for studying disease mechanisms, evaluating new drugs, and developing personalized medicine approaches. However, their production still requires complex, lengthy processes that depend heavily on manual intervention by operators.

The goal of FAR-O is to develop the first fully automated platform capable of directly transforming patients' cells into organoids, integrating advanced technologies for cellular reprogramming, microfluidics, and robotic automation. The platform will make it possible to increase production speed, improve the reproducibility of results, and make this technology accessible on a scale compatible with future clinical and industrial applications.