Tarragona has become this week the European seat for protecting health and the environment from the risks posed by chemical products. Around a hundred scientists, researchers, and risk assessors from across the continent are gathered until Thursday to set the roadmap for the European Union's scientific regulation in chemical safety for the coming years.
The Biomedical Research Institute of Catalonia South (IRB CatSud) is leading this meeting, which brings together representatives from 200 international organizations. The primary objective is to accelerate a paradigm shift through the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and cutting-edge technologies in assessing the risks that chemical products pose to health and the environment. These new analytical approaches aim to predict the impact of contaminants more rapidly, accurately, transparently, and efficiently.
The meeting, which began on Monday, is co-organized by IRB CatSud along with international scientific bodies from Germany (BfR), France (ANSES), and Greece (AUTH). It includes the participation of top European regulatory authorities, such as the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), and the European Medicines Agency (EMA).
Throughout Monday and Tuesday, presentations and debates focused on the impact of emerging technologies, with a special emphasis on using AI language models to automate risk assessment. In parallel, specialists participated in an intensive hackathon to develop prototypes of next-generation analytical tools.
On Wednesday, the focus shifted to the annual meeting of the scientific data management working group (WP7), led by the VITO institute (Belgium), the University of Birmingham (United Kingdom), and IRB CatSud (represented by Vikas Kumar and his team). Experts discussed guidelines to ensure the vast amount of information generated in Europe is fully accessible and interoperable. This will lay the groundwork for the future Centre for Chemical Risk Assessment and contribute to the creation of the EU's Common Data Platform on Chemical Substances.
This meeting is part of the European project PARC (Partnership for the Assessment of Risks from Chemicals), a 400-million-euro megaproject co-funded by the EU's Horizon Europe framework program. PARC unites over 200 public and academic institutions from nearly 30 countries to advance the European Commission's Chemicals Sustainability Strategy and move towards the zero-pollution objective of the European Green Deal.
