Biography
Professor Robert A. Harris
Professor Robert A. Harris (Bob) was born in Harpenden in Southern UK in 1966. He conducted a Bsc.Hons undergraduate degree at Portsmouth Polytechnic, majoring in Parasitology in 1987. PhD studies at University College London studying innate immune agglutinins in Schistosoma host snail species with Terry Preston and Vaughan Southgate as supervisors culminated with a thesis defence in early 1991. A 2.5 year postdoc at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine in Paul Kaye’s research group ensued, with focus on understanding the intracellular fate of Leishmania spp. protozoans in macrophages. Bob was awarded a Wellcome Trust postdoctoral fellowship that permitted his relocation to the Karolinska Institutet (Stockholm, Sweden) in the spring of 1994. A postdoc period was spent split between the labs of Anders Örn and Tomas Olsson, in which he studied Trypanosoma cruzi and Trypanosoma bruceii protozoan proteins. Bob became an Associate Professor at the Karolinska Institutet in 1999, heralding his establishment as a PI. Bob started to work with autoimmune diseases in 1996 and began study of therapy using live parasite infections or parasite molecules. His research group has developed autoantigen-specific vaccines, defined the effects of post-translational biochemical molecules on autoantigenicity and developed a macrophage adoptive transfer therapy that prevents pathogenesis in several experimental disease models. He became Professor of Immunotherapy in Neurological Diseases in 2013. In recent years research focus has centred on understanding the immunopathogenesis of incurable neurodegenerative diseases, with particular emphasis on development of immunotherapies directed at microglial cells as potential therapeutic paradigms.
Bob Harris CV July 2020
ERIK HERLENIUS GROUP
Development of autonomic control
About
Immature or deficient autonomic control is a common problem in infants born at a premature age and is of central importance in apneas, secondary hypoxic brain damage and sudden infant death syndrome.
PER ERIKSSON GROUP
Research
For better understanding of disturbances in respiratory control we study early development of cardiorespiratory control, brainstem neural networks and its associations with normal and pathological breathing. The conceptual change introduced by our recent data that endogenous prostaglandins are central pathogenic factors in respiratory disorders and the hypoxic response, open new diagnostic and therapeutic avenues that should significantly better the diagnostics and treatment of newborns and adult patients.
Inflammation is a major culprit in breathing disorders and we hypothesize that by using a newly developed urinary prostaglandin biomarker we can screen, detect and protect against inflammation related breathing disorders.
Our collaborative efforts enable us to move from a clinical problem to molecular understanding of the disease and studies are performed in patients, animal & in vitro models.
Our research is focused on the development of autonomic control with normal and paediatric patients as the target. Autonomic dysfunction in breathing and circulatory control often has its origin in neurodevelopment disorders. Furthermore, our basic research in developmental neuroscience how neural activity and stem cells form activity dependent networks is vital for the development of therapeutic interventions.
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Contact: communication@cmm.se
CENTER FOR MOLECULAR MEDICINE
Published 2022-04-08
Michael Sundström. Photo: Anne-Li Engström
The Board of the Center for Molecular Medicine (CMM) has appointed Michael Sundström as the new Director of CMM. An experienced scientist, business leader and manager, Michael assumed his position on April 1, 2022.
Michael Sundström received his PhD from Uppsala University, followed by postdoctoral studies at Karolinska Institutet. He has more than 30 years of international experience in leading pharmaceutical and biotechnology organisations. He has held positions as Director for structure-based drug design and oncology Research & Development portfolio management at Pharmacia, as well as senior positions at Actar and Biovitrum. In 2003, he was one of the co-founders of the Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) working at the University of Oxford as Chief Scientist. After moving to the positions of Managing Director for the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research in Copenhagen, and later Vice President of Discovery Research at Karolinska Development in Stockholm, he rejoined the SGC in mid-2014. As Scientific Director for the SGC Karolinska laboratory based at CMM, he mainly focuses on leading large European projects in partnership with the pharmaceutical industry. The projects aim to generate high-quality research tools, such as antibodies and chemical probes, for use in translational medicine research studies.
As CMM Director Michael Sundström will work in close cooperation with the Karolinska University Hospital, Karolinska Institutet and Region Stockholm in order to continue strengthening the connection between clinical and molecular research. In addition, together with the scientists, the CMM Board, CMM Steering Group and support personnel, he will further develop the Center as a leading and attractive cross-disciplinary research environment.
“I am very glad to have Michael Sundström on board as the new CMM Director. With his profile and experience, he is the right candidate to shoulder the responsibility of further developing our internationally recognised research center, with excellent foundations laid by previous Directors Professor Lars Terenius, Professor Lars Klareskog and Professor Helena Erlandsson Harris. With Michael Sundström leading the way, we are looking forward to continuing our close collaboration with the Karolinska University Hospital, Karolinska Institutet and Region Stockholm. I strongly believe Michael Sundström will lead CMM into the next phase. The future is bright.”, says Liselotte Jansson, Chair of the Board of the Center for Molecular Medicine.”
“It is truly exciting to take on this new role and set out to further develop CMM together with all the professionals who are the basis for its creative research environment. I believe that CMM has an excellent model for working at the lead of translational research, connecting the real health-related needs with intellectual capital, forefront scientific knowledge and technological possibilities. I am looking forward to further strengthening the organisation and our collective research outputs.”
About CMM
CMM is a foundation instituted by the Stockholm County Council (SLL), currently Region Stockholm and works in close collaboration between Karolinska University Hospital and Karolinska Institutet.