News archive

Karin Holmsten at Karolinska Institutet has been awarded Pfizer’s and the Swedish Society for Urological Oncology’s (SFUO) newly established research grant for oncologists in urology. The grant of 50,000 SEK was awarded on October 17th at SFUO’s annual meeting in Stockholm.

Since 23 September Campus Solna has two new road names. Blombäcks väg has replaced Retzius väg and Liljestrands väg has replaced von Eulers väg.

The application period for Karolinska Institutet’s programmes that start in January 2025 ended on 15 October. Several of these programmes saw an increase in overall applicants and first-choice applicants. Educational programmes for professionals, for which applications closed on 15 September, also showed greater demand compared to the previous year.

On 5 September, master students in global health and public health attended a Welcome Day that involved information about what it means to be a student at GPH, available student support, and a case challenge.

GPH welcomed the Vice President of Higher Education earlier this week. Ewa Ehrenborg, a professor of molecular cardiovascular medicine at the Department of Medicine, Solna, has been the chairperson of the Committee for Higher Education since January 1, 2023.

This interactive workshop was organized by Prof. Marie Löf, leader for the IMPACT research group and the Centre for Nutrition, together with our new Foreign Adjunct Professor, Ralph Maddison (Deakin University, Australia).

On July 1, 2023, research group leader Karin Jensen was employed as professor at the Department of Clinical Neuroscience (CNS).

Hi Andreas Rydell doctoral student at the Division of Family Medicine and Primary Care. On November 7 you will defend your thesis "Impaired lung function and the development of cardiovascular disease". What is the main focus of the thesis?

The Department of Physiology & Pharmacology (FyFa) is celebrating 75 years at Campus Solna. This milestone is marked by, among other things, a special issue of Pharmacological Reviews, celebrating the long-standing collaboration between the department and the journal, both of which celebrating the 75th anniversary this year.

We are happy to introduce: Rodrigo Fernandez Gonzalo new research group leader at Labmed and the Division of Clinical Physiology.

For three days, the classrooms in the Widerströmska building were particularly buzzing, when the research group Global Disaster Medicine conducted their course ‘Disaster Medicine - Health Care Response to Major Injuries, Health Crises and Disasters’ for specialist doctors. The research group has been running the course since 2018, but this was the first time it was held at Widerströmska.

Is your research project in need of funding "outside normal calls"? The Development Office at KI provides professional advice and support to researchers when they need help with fundraising and donation management.

Our body perception relies on how the brain interprets and integrates signals from various sensory systems, including vision, touch, and proprioception – our body’s ability to sense its position and movement in space. In a recent study, researchers at Karolinska Institutet demonstrated that nociception, the sensory process that detects potentially damaging stimuli to the body, also plays a role in shaping our body perception. The article was recently published in the scientific journal PAIN.

The Graduation survey 23/24 reveals that students at KI are satisfied with their education and feel well-prepared for their future professional life. The students' answers provide important perspectives and ideas for the development of education.

Professor Malin Flodström-Tullberg at Karolinska Institutet has been awarded this year’s Johnny Ludvigsson Prize for Outstanding Nordic Researcher. The prize recognizes her groundbreaking research on the mechanisms behind type 1 diabetes.

In a recent conversation, Abishek Arora, the founding Co-chair of the NeurotechEU Student Council and student representative at Karolinska Institutet, opened up about his transformative experience with the NeurotechEU initiative.

In September, the Department of Global Public Health and the research group Global Child Health and the Sustainable Development Goals, were visited by a delegation of eight medical doctors and researchers from Indonesia. The visit was the beginning of a four-year long collaboration on a PhD twinning arrangement and research on critical care, supported by Carl Bennet AB.

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have mapped how small RNA molecules, such as the recently Nobel Prize-awarded microRNAs, control cell development in the human embryo during the first days after fertilisation. The findings, published in Nature Communications, may eventually contribute to improved fertility treatment.

A decision was made by KI’s President on Tuesday regarding compensation for the freezer failure in Neo. The Department of Medicine, Huddinge (MedH) will be compensated with a total of SEK 30 million to be distributed to the affected researchers for costs incurred, and to begin recreating the collection of research material that has been lost.

The Department of Dental Medicine and the University Dental Clinic are unique at KI in being environmentally certified according to ISO 14001:2015. On October 22 to 24, 2024, we welcome Susanne Evergård from Intertek who will perform re-certification. She is here all days.

New, effective, personalised cancer immunotherapy, better treatment for inflammatory bowel disease and improved protection against infections and viruses are some examples of basic research that is now being funded by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation. Of the total of 30 projects sharing SEK 835 million, seven are run by researchers at Karolinska Institutet.

Joar von Bahr holds a medical degree from Karolinska Institutet, where he graduated in January 2024. He recently had his ISP seminar at GPH, where he presented his research plans for the coming years. We got a few minutes of his time to dig deeper in to his PhD project.

On 10 October, University Director Veronika Sundström held a digital staff meeting for KI's Professional Services (PS). During the meeting, she presented an upcoming decision on the new organisation of PS. Below is a summary of the information shared.

Seasonal flu will soon be sweeping the country. All Dentmed and Unitand employees have the opportunity to get vaccinated against seasonal flu at no cost, according to a management decision.

The course catalogue for the spring semester of 2025 is now open for application! Please note that the application period is three weeks, with the final application day being 5 November.

In connection with the installation of professors on 3 October, Professor Jennifer Cleland received Karolinska Institutet's prize for research in medical education, KIPRIME, 2024. Her work has, among other things, changed the way medical universities in the UK select and examine students. The aim of Professor Cleland's research is to address inequalities in healthcare skills needs.

Welcome to Shanzina Sompa's presentation of her thesis ”Electronic cigarettes and pulmonary effects : a translational approach”.

Every year, hundreds of doctoral and postdoctoral trainees, as well as researchers, travel across the Atlantic for conferences, lectures – and fika. These gatherings take place at two prestigious institutions: Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm and the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. The collaboration between the two top-ranking institutions is now celebrating its 30th anniversary at KI. Some of the pioneering spirits who were on board from the start look back on what has made it a success.

ADHD can be a lifelong condition and have a significantly negative impact on life. However, maturity plays a role in this context. Approximately half of those diagnosed as children continue to have pronounced ADHD symptoms into adulthood.

Can fluctuating levels of female sex hormones worsen ADHD symptoms in women? That is what researchers at Karolinska Institutet want to investigate.

Over the past 15 years, the number of ADHD diagnoses has risen sharply in Sweden. Is this development reasonable? And what might be the cause? Whilst asking these questions, researchers would also like us to focus less on the diagnosis and more on the functional capacity of people with ADHD.

We welcome Iréne Zettervall to our economics unit at LIME.

Centre stage at this year’s professorial installation ceremony at KI were stately academic tradition, prestigious medals and evocative entertainment – as well as intergenerational mingling between KI researchers and students at a much-appreciated hot dog truck outside Aula Medica on a chilly October evening.

If you have an interest in culture, there are several initiatives at KI to participate and get involved in. Giulia Gaudenzi, Assistant Professor at the Department of Global Public Health is also a member of the Cultural Council at KI and we asked her to list the cultural activities available at KI.

The Swedish Society of Medicine (SLS) awards Professor Lars-Olof Wahlund, Karolinska Institutet, the Bengt Winblad Prize 2024. The prize honors outstanding contributions in Alzheimer’s research, and Lars-Olof Wahlund is seen as a pioneer in MRI imaging of the brain.

The National Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention (NASP) at Karolinska Institutet and Region Stockholm is looking for middle and high schools in Stockholm County to participate in an interview study. The purpose of the study is to investigate the feasibility of later school start times.

A new study by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), with contribution from Karolinska Institutet, has revealed that one in three cases of oral cancer globally is linked to smokeless tobacco and areca nut use.

Stephan Rössner and Carol Tishelman are to be awarded the 2024 KI Silver Medal. The medal is conferred upon individuals who have made particularly commendable efforts in support of Karolinska Institutet’s activities. The researchers will receive their medals at the Diligence and Devotion ceremony next February.

Every year in October, when the recipients of the Nobel Prizes are announced, the Nobel Prize Museum organizes events and meetings in collaboration with, among others, Karolinska Institutet. This year Professor Tobias Alfvén from the Department of Global Public Health teamed up with Secretary General of UNICEF Sweden Pernilla Baralt for a seminar about vaccination.

On Saturday 5 October, the ARC Team, consisting of Franziska Steffens and Federico Triolo, took part in the 2024 Mental Health Run at Djurgården, in close to perfect weather conditions.

They work with highly specialised equipment for facilities that they have often built up themselves. Although not themselves researchers, their expertise, experience and international contacts render them indispensable for research at KI. A year ago, new titles were created for this important category of employee.

Tips from KI Grants Office about current calls.

On October 3-4, Biomedicum carried out evacuation exercises. We ask questions about the exercise to Jennie Eldh Bastman from Facility Management (FM), who is responsible for fire safety at Biomedicum.

A new study from Karolinska Institutet, published in Science Translational Medicine, shows that people with type 2 diabetes have lower levels of the protein that breaks down and converts creatine in the muscles. This leads to impaired function of the mitochondria, the 'powerhouses' of the cell.

David Baker, USA, has succeeded in creating entirely new proteins – the building blocks of life that control all biological processes in the body. He shares the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 with Demis Hassabis and John M. Jumper of Google DeepMind, UK, who have developed the AI tool AlphaFold2. “Now it can take minutes instead of years to get a good idea of what a protein looks like and how it may function,” says KI professor Luca Jovine, who intitiated a collaboration with DeepMind early on.

Prof. Rikard Holmdahl granted DKK 5.9 million by Novo Nordisk Foundation

If you are reading this, you might be a student, an alumnus, or considering studying at Karolinska Institutet. Regardless, you probably have your own idea of what it is like to be a new student at KI, whether you have experienced it or not. Here, two students – one who is brand new and one who has studied a few semesters – answer questions about how it is, or was, to be new KI students.

To facilitate new and existing contacts between researchers and doctoral students as well as increase research collaboration across the NeurotechEU network, the KI NeurotechEU group is introducing the availability of limited competitive funds for a lab visit for PhD students and postdocs during Spring 2025.