The ISIDORe consortium, made of the capacities of European ESFRI infrastructures and coordinated networks, proposes to assemble the largest and most diverse research and service providing instrument to study infectious diseases in Europe, from structural biology to clinical trials. Giving scientists access to the whole extent of our state of the art facilities, cutting edge services, advanced equipment and expertise, in an integrated way and with a common goal, will enable or accelerate the generation of new knowledge and intervention tools to ultimately help control SARS CoV 2 in particular, and epidemic prone pathogens in general, while avoiding fragmentation and duplication among European initiatives. Such a global and interdisciplinary approach is meant to allow the implementation of user projects that are larger, more ambitious and more impactful than the EU supported transnational activities that the consortium is used to run. Our proposition is ambitious but achievable in a timely fashion due to the relevance and previous experience of the partners that we have gathered and that have complementary fields of expertise, which addresses the need for an interdisciplinary effort. Leveraging all these existing strengths to develop synergies will create an additional value and enhance Europe capacity for controlling emerging or re emerging and epidemic infectious diseases, starting with the COVID 19 pandemic. Such a global and coordinated approach is consistent with the recommendations of the One Health concept and necessary to make significant contributions to solving complex societal problems like epidemics and pandemics.

TheThe analysis of the human microbiome (genome of memberThe analysis of the human microbiome (genome of members of microbiota that is composed of billions of micro-organisms) is an emerging research area of considerable interest in human health and diseases. Disruption of the microbial community is a major risk factor for many diseases such as metabolic syndrome, immune disorders, cancer development, and is linked to limited response to treatment. In the last decade, numerous initiatives and projects were launched to take advantage of new, high-throughput technologies to characterize the human microbiome and to explore its relationship with health/diseases. Also concrete actions were engaged to provide a tangible response to the need to standardize and harmonize study methods and protocols, as well as regulations. Despite the increasing number of European and International initiatives on human microbiome, very few studies have been carried out in North Africa (NA). Therefore, there is an urgent need in NA for the development of skills in human microbiome analysis. With the support of the EU partners (Institut National de Recherche Agronomique (INRA)-Jouy en Josas and Aix Marseille University () from France and Florence University (UNIFI) from Italy), USFAX, aims to be a leading force in the region by: (i) increasing its staff capacities using new technological approaches such as Shotgun metagenome sequencing for the analysis of the human microbiome (ii) adopting a standardized approaches for collecting samples and analyzing data (iii) setting up and coordinating a consortium on human microbiomeat NA level building to start with on existing collaborations with Morocco, Algeria and Egypt that we have named “the North African Human Microbiome Consortium” (NAHMC). The MICAfrica objectives would be achieved through implementation of vertical coordination and support measures related to the definition of a scientific strategy for human and capital capacity building.