Hello new staff #17

Miina comes from Tampere, Finland, where she did her PhD about osteogenic differentiation mechanisms of mesenchymal stromal cells, followed by a postdoc in Bergen, Norway, focused on 3D bone bioprinting. Since 2018 she has worked in Prof. Molly Stevens’ lab at Karolinska Solna, where she has specialized in lipid nanoparticle-mediated oligonucleotide delivery and STORM super-resolution microscopy. At Labmed she will work at the Karolinska ATMP Center on lipid nanoparticle formulation and characterization for various different projects.

Jens did his PhD with Jonas Frisén at KI, where he studied neuronal cell replacement in mice. After that he did his postdoc in Stanley Qi’s lab at Stanford University, where he and his colleagues developed new synthetic biology technology using CRISPR and computational tools for precise cell fate engineering. Now he is excited to combine his two fields of expertise and use synthetic biology to advance cell therapy.

Mark's journey in cancer research started in Canada where he studied resistance in breast cancer. After completing his doctorate, he studied the role of a novel intracellular inhibitory immune checkpoint - inhibition of which unleashes immunity against cancer. With supervision from Professor Dhifaf Sarhan at Karolinska Institutet, he will study the role of adaptive natural killer cells in the context of pancreatic and ovarian cancers. They will also address the interaction between NK cells and adaptive B cells in the context of tumor immunity. He is looking forward to making discoveries at KI.

Vera comes from Tyrol, Austria, and completed her master’s in Immunobiology at the University of Vienna. In her master's thesis, she investigated the role of NK cells in COVID-19 severity. She has previously worked in the field of translational oncology at the Medical University of Innsbruck. As a research assistant in Dhifaf Sarhan's group at KI, she will focus on the role of NK cells, particularly adaptive NK cells, in cancer, as well as the crosstalk between B and NK cells using organoid models.

Ricardo interested in neuromuscular physiology and in how the brain and spinal cord control our muscles. He did a bachelor’s in Sports Science (University of Lisbon, Portugal), a master’s in Biology of Physical Activity (University of Jyväskylä, Finland), a PhD on motoneuron physiology (Edith Cowan University, Australia), and had post-PhD positions also at ECU and at Chalmers (Sweden). For anyone who's ever experienced a muscle cramp, you may have wondered about the physiological mechanisms behind it. The truth is, we still don’t fully understand them. He will be conducting basic and applied physiology studies to better understand this long-running mystery. We must elucidate cramp mechanisms, so we can finally implement effective strategies that target the causes. He is also looking forward to collaborating in other projects here at Labmed!

Clara is from Switzerland and has previously completed her Master's in Bioinformatics and Systems Biology at the Vrije Universiteit and Universiteit van Amsterdam. She is now continuing her PhD studies under Dr. Victoria Menendez Benito and Prof. Uwe Tietge's supervision, deciphering the biology of nuclear lipid droplets. 

Iva trained as an immunologist at Imperial College London (MSc) and the University of Cambridge (PhD). Her previous research focused on the molecular and functional features of innate lymphocytes in cancer, infection, and inflammation. Before joining Labmed, she worked at MedH, studying tissue-resident immune cells, with a strong focus on single-cell biology.

Iva has joined Ujjwal Neogi’s Systems Virology Lab as a Research Specialist to contribute to the interdisciplinary EU-funded COMBAT project, investigating the interactions between the dengue virus and the human immune system.