News archive

Ole Petter Ottersen has been president of Karolinska Institutet for five and a half years. At the end of this month, February 2023, he will be leaving his office for the last time. Of all he has seen and done during this time, one day is particularly memorable.

5G is now activated for all KI's mobile subscriptions from Telia.

Are you interested sharing your knowledge with school children or members of non-profit organisations? The Swedish non-profit organisation Public & Science (Vetenskap & Allmänhet, VA) are looking for researchers to participate in the project 'Lend a researcher'.

As air pollution in Stockholm has decreased, so has the lung capacity of children and adolescents has improved, a new study published in the European Respiratory Journal reports. The researchers from Karolinska Institutet consider the results important, since the lung health of the young greatly affects the risk of their developing chronic lung diseases later in life.

Women with rheumatic diseases are at greater risk of complications during pregnancy and childbirth, but for women with axial spondyloarthritis the risks have decreased over the last ten years, according to a register study from Karolinska Institutet. This decrease coincided with an increased use of biologic drugs during the same period. The study was published in The Lancet Rheumatology.

In the future the wireless network KI Guest will be protected by the KI web filter, which is currently active on all other networks.

This autumn the course “Leadership coure for research group leaders and teams leaders” starts. The aim of the course is to enhance participants’ knowledge about academic leadership and how to build conditions for dynamic research group development. Register 15th April at the latest.

The first detailed description of the microbiota and immune cells among asymptomatic Helicobacter pylori-infected individuals has been published by researchers at Karolinska Institutet. The results of the study will be instrumental to understand the complex microbiome and immunity network and provide new insights for asymptomatic Helicobacter pylori infection.

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have been looking at how movement shapes our senses and how sensory and motor processes are both affected in Parkinson’s disease. In a study published in Nature Communications, de la Torre-Martinez et al, show that movement reduces the responses to sensory input and that both sensory and motor processes are altered in an animal model of Parkinson’s disease.

The regulations for which categories of international students and researchers can be offered accommodation from Swedish universities have recently changed. A new ordinance gives all universities the opportunity to offer housing to selected groups of students and researchers. However, this means that KI does not have the opportunity to offer housing to the same extent as before.

Tips from KI Grants Office about current calls.

Marie Arsenian Henriksson has been named the new academic vice president for research and chair of the Committee for Research at Karolinska Institutet as of March 1, following a decision by KI's president on February 21.

Professor Molly Stevens at Karolinska Institutet and Imperial College London has been awarded the 2023 Novo Nordisk Prize for her pioneering work in innovative bioengineering approaches. One of her goals is to democratise access to healthcare using nanotechnologies.

Three questions to Karin Grahn, Unit of Occupational Medicine at the Institute of Environmental Medicine (IMM)

On the international news site The Conversation you can read an article by Logan Pendergrast and Juleen Zierath, of the Integrative Physiology research group, where they explain their latest findings on “Morning exercise burns more body fat, mouse study shows".

Scheduled maintenance work for IDAC on February 22, between 13:00 and 22:00 will take place.
During this day, it will be possible to search for employees / students and use the "Reset password" service in the IDAC portal. Please, we do not ask you to use the remaining services in the IDAC portal between 13:00 and 22:00

KI's annual report for 2022 was submitted to the government on 17 February.

In some cases, there are problems retrieving shopping baskets from suppliers' online stores (Punch-outs) via UBW e-commerce.
In case of problems, please try another browser and if you use MAC, try a PC if possible.

If it is not possible to retrieve the shopping basket with new attempts, use "find products" in the e-commerce. See picture.

Troubleshooting in progress.

It is important that you periodically check that your phone has the latest system updates installed.

Application is now open for a new global leadership programme; Leadership for Transformative Change. The programme targets leaders from all over the world who are working to contribute to transformative social development in their countries. It is offered by Uppsala University in collaboration with Karolinska Institutet, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Business Sweden, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and SALAR International.

The Centre for Health Crises at KI is expanding its group of expert coordinators. This time it is the area of expertise is health systems resilience, and it comes in the form of Helena Nordenstedt, associate professor and medical doctor, with an extensive experience. Her research interests span the area of global health and resilience to crises on a systems level.

Tips from KI Grants Office about current calls.

The government decided on Thursday 16 February to appoint Annika Östman Wernerson president of Karolinska Institutet. She will assume office on 1 March 2023.

Thanks to donations from numerous actors, Karolinska Institutet is now able to create a new professorship in prevention medicine. The professorship is named after its patron, HRH Prince Daniel.

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Many patients with the autoimmune disease ANCA-associated vasculitis (AAV) suffer a high risk of disease relapse despite treatment. KI researchers have now identified T cells that contribute to the destruction of kidney tissue in patients with AAV and suggest the possibility of T cell screening to identify individuals at high risk. The study was published in Kidney International.

Researchers from Karolinska Institutet have discovered that the genes encoding our T cell receptors vary greatly between persons and populations, which may explain why we respond differently to for example infections. The findings, presented in the journal Immunity, also demonstrate that some gene variants are inherited from Neanderthals.

Aristeidis Grigoriadis, from the Gastroenterology and Rheumatology Unit at the Department of Medicine, Huddinge (MedH) will defend his thesis "Magnetic resonance imaging as a tool for diagnosis, evaluation and prognosis in patients with primary sclerosing cholangitis" on February 17, 2023. Main Supervisor is Annika Bergquist (MedH).

Meet Charlotte Hedin, research group leader at the Division of Clinical Medicine, Department of Medicine, Solna.

Meet Elisabet Svenungsson, research group leader at the Division of Rheumatology, Department of Medicine, Solna.

When Harriet Nakigozi heard about the course “Managing innovation for sustainable health”, she was in the middle of her postgraduate studies. Despite that, she applied to join the course. It soon turned out to be the right decision as the two courses supported each other.

Following a request from KI's President, the Centre for Health Crises has produced the report Improved preparedness for the next health crises – lessons learned at KI during the COVID-19 pandemic. The report outlines the changes that were made and the lessons learned from the work KI did during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is now available to read online in its entirety.

The 2023 call for applications comprises up to 65 KID grants.

The Centre for Health Crises at KI has published its first annual report, covering activities at the Centre during 2022. Since it is the centre's first year in operation, the report also outline the background to the establishing of the centre, the centre's organisational structure and introduces the staff.

The Swedish government is strengthening the work with dementia by allocating SEK 8 million in a new investment for strengthened elderly care. In this initiative, SveDem will be granted SEK 2.5 million in 2023 to develop the Swedish Register for Cognitive Diseases / Dementias (SveDem) and support the municipalities' improvement work in healthcare and care for people with dementia.

When Tewodros Seyoum wanted to improve his competence and leadership skills as a midwife, a KI education was the obvious choice. The training opened the door to a more active leadership style and knowledge that contributes to improving the Ethiopian healthcare system.

Patients with heart failure often suffer from co-morbidities, which places a great strain on the healthcare services, a multinational study published in Heart reports. The researchers, who are based at Karolinska Institutet, identify an urgent need to improve risk management of the disease.

Physical activity at the right time of the day seems able to increase fat metabolism, at least in mice. A new study from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden and the University of Copenhagen in Denmark shows that mice that did exercise in an early active phase, which corresponds to morning exercise in humans, increased their metabolism more than mice that did exercise at a time when they usually rest. The results are published in the journal PNAS.

Type 2 diabetes is a common disease, affecting 10 % of the adult world population, in which heredity and overweight are known risk factors. In a new study at Karolinska Institutet, researchers show that women and men with a predisposition to diabetes have different risk factors forecasting type 2 diabetes and prediabetes. The results were recently published in the journal Frontiers in Endocrinology.

An audit of KI’s greenhouse gas emissions reveals that the greatest volumes come from the purchase of goods and official travel. KI is now upping its climate game in several areas.

The Division of Nursing hosted an afternoon focused on how to reach out and communicate research and research results. The event took place on February 2, in cooperation with the divisions of Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy, PUF-V and the KI Communications and Public Relations Office.

The earthquake in Turkey and Syria has left many thousands dead and injured, and caused widespread devastation. Relatives, colleagues and friends elsewhere are also greatly affected.

The StratNeuro Bridging Grant at the consolidator level is a funding initiative where StratNeuro awards outstanding researchers in the field of neuroscience at Karolinsk Institutet, who have not been awarded the KI consolidator grant or equivalent, giving them the opportunity to consolidate their research.

The default typeface in Outlook will be changed to Arial as part of the implementation of KI's updated visual identity.

Tips from Grants Office regarding current calls

The interplay between sex steroid hormones, psychiatric- and neurodevelopmental disorders and adverse behavioral outcomes is in focus in a new thesis from Karolinska Institutet.

Infants whose mothers have used snus (a moist oral tobacco product) during pregnancy run three times the risk of sudden infant death, according to a comprehensive registry study from Karolinska Institutet published in the journal Pediatric Research. The risk was much lower if the mother had stopped taking snus before the first antenatal visit. The researchers conclude that all types of nicotine products should be avoided during pregnancy.

A new semester means new plans for the student unions at Karolinska Institutet. The focus will, among other things, be to renovate the premises, expand the introduction weeks, and continue their work to make members feel at home.

The Ministry of Health and Social Affairs has decided on new appointments for all 14 members of the Government's Council on Geriatric Research and appointed Mats Thorslund as a new member. This means that NVS has four representatives on the council.

Are you interested to know what it's like to study abroad? Then you should check out the Study Abroad blog, where KI students share their lives as exchange students. New Zealand, London, and Spain are some of the places where the current KI students are spending this spring semester.