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Transportation Info

Reaching Patras By Ferry

There are direct overnight trips via ferries connecting Patras with the Italian ports of Ancona, Bari, Brindisi and Venice. You may have a look at the Online Ferry Booking database, or directly to the websites of the ferry companies that operate between Patras and these Italian ports, e.g., Anek Lines, Minoan Lines and Superfast Ferries.

How to get to Patras from Athens International Airport

Upon arrival at Athens International Airport El. Venizelos, there are four (4) options to get to Patras. The most inexpensive way is by public transportation via bus. Other ways to travel to Patras from Athens are by car, train, or taxi. Taxi fares range from €280 to €350 depending on the operator.

1. Athens to Patras by ECM9 PRIVATE TRANSPORT BUS SERVICE

To accommodate conference attendee’s transfer needs to Patras, ecm9 team has arranged private transport bus services.

Book your transfer from Athens Airport directly to your hotel in Patras, HERE. The fare is 40 euros.

2. Athens to Patras by Bus

If you wish to travel by bus from Athens to Patra, you have to transfer to Kifissos Central Bus station (commonly referred to as KTEL). To reach KTEL, you have two options:

  • Outside the Airport terminal (Arrivals) you can take Bus X93. It takes approximately over one hour to get to Kifissos Central Bus Station (KTEL) during rush hour.
  • Tickets cost 6 euro – purchasable at the kiosk just outside the bus and then validate them once on the bus.
  • From the airport you can use the Μetro to the Bus Station (KTEL Achaia’s) and get off to

“Agios Antonios” station, a 3‐minute walk to KTEL Achaia’s.

Upon Arrival at Kifissos Central Bus Station:

Once you have arrived at Kifissos Central Bus Station), you will need to find KTEL Achaia’s ticket counter for a bus going to Patras. There are buses every half an hour or so. While advisable to purchase ticket before boarding, you can buy on the bus. You can use this link to check the bus timetable: https://www.ktelachaias.gr/en/homepage-en/ , or book a ticket in advance. Return tickets are discounted, but only if you book them in person.

The bus Terminal Station in Patras (KTEL PATRAS) is centrally located and the distance to the center of the city is short, but depending on where you are staying in Patras, you may need to take a taxi.

KTEL bus ticket to Patras costs €18.90. All in all, taking the bus from Athens Airport to Patras will cost you €24.90.

3. Athens to Patras by Suburban Railway

If you choose the Suburban Railway, you can use a combination of the suburban railway and a bus to Patras.

  • Take the suburban railway from the airport to “Kato Aharnai” station, and then switch to another train that will bring you to the town of Kiato (a coastal town on the Northern Peloponnese, close to Patras). While there are fewer trains per day than KTEL buses, this route is more scenic, and avoids traffic. In Kiato, you will need to take the transfer bus to On the train, tickets are only issued for this one‐way service (no return tickets in advance). If the passenger boards at a station where there is an operational ticket counter, there is a surcharge on the final ticket price.

Please note that you cannot pay by credit card on the train

The line AIRPORT ‐ KIATO suburban line operates every day. Regular service hours: 6:49 AM ‐ 4:49 PM. You may ask for more information at the airport (tickets booth)

Due to several changes in the train system in Greece please consult: https://www.hellenictrain.gr/en

4. From the Athens airport to Patras by car

Directions from the airport to Patras center:

The fastest way to get from Athens Airport (ATH) to Patras is by car.

The driving distance between Athens Airport (ATH) to Patras is 242 km and it takes approximately 2h 30 m.

From the Athens International Airport get into “ATTIKI ODOS” and drive until the last exit ELEFSINA, which connects to the National Motorway “OLYMPIA ODOS”. It is a new safe and convenient toll highway: https://www.olympiaodos.gr/en/

During this trip, there are five toll stations. After approx. 200 kilometres, you will pass through the last toll gate at Rion. Approx. 6 kilometres before Patras after the last tolls, you will continue straight and follow the signs to the city center and port.

(NOTE: Do not take the left‐hand lanes towards Pyrgos).
 

https://www.distancesfrom.com/directions‐from‐Athens‐nternational‐Airport‐to‐Patras‐Greece‐via‐Elefsina/DirectionHistory/3353949.aspx

Accommodation Info

Below there is a list for hotel suggestions around Patras center and close to the Venue. To reserve a room, please contact the hotel directly, mentioning the code  “ECM9”

If you are interested in finding a low-cost hotel in Patras for you, fill free to contact us at [email protected]

Byzantino Hotel (4*)

cost/night
70€

Airotel Patras Smart (3*)

cost/night
70€

Galaxy Hotel (3*)

cost/night
68€

Mediterranee Hotel (3*)

cost/night
65€

My Way Hotel (4*)

cost/night
90€

Palaiologos Hotel (4*)

cost/night
75€

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Contact

Prof. Amandine Everard

Metabolism and Nutrition Research Group, Louvain Drug Research Institute, Walloon Excellence in Life Sciences and BIOtechnology (WELBIO), UCLouvain, Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium

Bio

Amandine Everard is a researcher associate from the FNRS (Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique) at UCLouvain in Brussels, Belgium. She is professor and leading a researcher group studying the roles of gut microbes in the regulation of host metabolism and food intake at the Louvain Drug Research Institute.

She is author of more than 50 research publications in that field and her work is internationally recognized as she is part of the Highly Cited Researcher over the world.

Summary

Gut microbes: a promising therapeutic target for obesity and type-2 diabetes?

The gut microbiota is a key player involved in health and diseases. Gut microbes have been identified as important regulators of host metabolism. Therefore, different tools targeting the gut microbiota such as probiotics, are studied to reduce obesity and metabolic disorders. Probiotics have a long history of use even if a clear definition only emerged at the end the twentieth century. The more commonly exploited species are lactobacilli and bifidobacteria. Over these last years, other genus were also proposed as potential beneficial microbes and are referred as next-generation beneficial bacteria candidates. Among the potential next-generation beneficial bacteria that are under investigation in the context of obesity, Akkermansia muciniphila seems to be a promising candidate. Akkermansia muciniphila is inversely associated with obesity, diabetes, cardiometabolic diseases and low-grade inflammation. We demonstrated that this bacterium was able to counteract diet-induced obesity and metabolic disorders in mice. Nowadays, a large body of evidence also demonstrates the causal beneficial effects of Akkermansia muciniphila in several preclinical models. In order to translate these preclinical data into human applications, we administered this bacterium in volunteers suffering from overweight and metabolic syndrome. This study demonstrates that pasteurized Akkermansia muciniphila was safe and well tolerated in humans. Moreover, this first exploratory study reveals that Pasteurized Akkermansia muciniphila has also protectives effects on the deleterious progression of the metabolic syndrome over time in humans. In conclusion, these results support the interest of targeting gut microbes to counteract metabolic disorders.

Prof. Konstantinos Gerasimidis

Professor of Clinical Nutrition, University of Glasgow

Bio

Professor Konstantinos Gerasimidis is Professor of Clinical Nutrition. He has graduated in Nutrition and Dietetics and completed his postgraduate studies in Clinical Nutrition. During his doctoral research at the University of Glasgow, he explored the effect of exclusive enteral nutrition on the gut microbiota and nutritional status of children with Crohn’s disease; Professor Gerasimidis also leads a laboratory team which explores the role of gut microbiota and its interaction with diet in the onset, propagation, and management of acute and chronic conditions. He has a strong interest in exploring the effect of habitual diet, elimination diets and artificial nutritional support on the gut microbiota of children and adults with inflammatory bowel disease.

Summary

In the human gut resides a complex microbial community whose size is at least equal to that of the human body eucaryotic cells, but with a functional capacity which outnumbers that of the host by a number of 100. Recent evidence suggests that this microbial community, often named as the gut microbiome, is important not only for the onset of infectious disease but also for the development of non-communicable conditions, including conditions of the digestive tract. Diet is a major regulator of the human gut microbiome composition and function. However, the role of diet in the causal pathway between the gut microbiome and gastrointestinal disease can be complex. For example, in patients with coeliac disease, it is unclear if the gut microbiome plays a role in the underlying disease pathogenesis, or any changes observed are the effects of treatment with gluten free diet. Likewise, beneficial members of gut microbiome, like Bifidobacteria, have been implicated in the aetiology of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), but treatment of active IBS symptoms with a low FODMAP diet further decreases the concentration of these species, and interventions with probiotics have had modest only effects. An exciting area of future research is whether we can use microbial signatures as prognostic markers of adverse disease outcomes in conditions, like intestinal failure, and also if dietary manipulation of the gut microbiome can control disease activity outcomes in patients with Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis.

Dr Siv Kjølsrud Bøhn

Associate professor, Norwegian University of Life Sciences

Bio

Siv Kjølsrud Bøhn (PhD) is Associate professor at Norwegian University of Life Sciences. Her current scientific focus on improving health via impacting the gut microbiota. Bøhn participates in various clinical trials across different patient populations, mainly taking the responsibility of trial- design and implementation and outcomes ranging from the microbiota-effects, molecular biomarkers, to method validations and measures of fatigue and health-related quality of life. Bøhn has teaching and supervision expertise within nutrition, public health, cell biology, biotechnology, and immunology.

Bøhn has a solid background molecular effects of diet interventions in different patient populations with hands-on experience from clinical trial design, trial implementation and biobanking, biomarker profiling of inflammation and gene expression analysis as well as statistics and bioinformatics.

Summary

Introducing the gut microbiota – why do we have bacteria in our guts and why are they important for health?

On all bodily surfaces that are exposed to the environment we find a complex and diverse ecosystem of microorganisms (bacteria, viruses, fungi, and protozoa), collectively termed the microbiota. During the last decades it has become clear that the microbes in the gut (‘the gut microbiota’), are serving many beneficial roles for our health and that disturbances in the gut microbiota are associated with the development of many different diseases. During evolution we have adapted to co-exist with the microbes using efficient strategies to keep the microbes in check in the mucosal linings. At the same time, the microbes help us to digest ‘left-over’ food components that are otherwise indigestible to us. The products of bacterial metabolism in the gut not only provide energy, but also serve other roles such as regulating the immune responses. However, we are only at the beginning of understanding how the gut microbiota and their metabolic products affect our health.

The lecture will introduce the microbiota and broadly explain why we have bacteria in our guts, what they are doing there, how we control them, how they are affected by the food that we eat and why disturbances in the microbiota may lead to diseases of various kinds.