The European Union has approved funding of an Initial Training Network (ITN) NeuroGut for 4 years, with a total financial volume of 3.7 M € from the 7th Framework Programme. This is among the first such training networks in gastroenterology and it is devoted to "neural regulation of intestinal functions". It includes ten academic partners and two companies from 9 European countries, and in Spain is coordinated by Dr. Fernando Azpiroz and Dr. Javier Santos, from the Physiology and Pathophysiology of the Digestive Tract group at Vall d'Hebron Institute of Research (VHIR). ITNs of the EU are educational programs for doctoral students in specialized areas that have received insufficient representation in conventional academic curricula because of their borderline existence between different specialties. During the following 3 years, the Physiology and Pathophysiology of the Digestive Tract group at VHIR will train a European predoctoral researcher from outside Spain in Neurogastroenterology. For Dr. Santos, "it is a great opportunity to do further research in these common gastrointestinal diseases that are so connected with the brain, such as the stress with the Irritable Bowel Syndrome". Neurogastroenterology is a subspecialty of gastroenterology and investigates the influence of the nervous system (the central, the autonomic, and the enteric nervous system) on functions of the gastrointestinal tract (motility, secretion, absorption) and their dysfunctions, infections, and inflammation in disease states, but also with the effects of normal and abnormal functions on health, nutrition and psychological wellbeing. A special emphasis will be the role of the gut microbiome in gut-brain-gut interactions.The project will start with a kick-off meeting in Berlin on February 22st.