News archive

Karolinska Institutet awards grants from a large number of foundations and from donations. The foundations & donations award research and travel grants.

Over 70 employees and students from Karolinska Institutet participated in this year's international conference for health and medical education, AMEE 2025, which was held in Barcelona. The conference brought together over 4,000 participants from around the world and offered both future outlooks and important discussions on the role of education in a rapidly changing healthcare.

Social Affairs and Public Health Minister Jakob Forssmed recently visited Karolinska Institutet to attend an international seminar arranged to mark the launch of “A call to action for adolescents mental health and wellbeing”, the second report from the Lancet Commission on Adolescent Health and Wellbeing.

Everything we perceive is the result of neuronal activity in our brains. Daniel Lundqvist uses advanced brain imaging techniques to study the mind. His goal: to help improve the diagnosis and treatment of neurological disorders. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October. 

A Swedish-led research team at Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital has shown in a new randomized clinical trial that a low dose of the well-known medicine aspirin halves the risk of recurrence after surgery in patients with colon and rectal cancer with a certain type of genetic alteration in the tumor.

Musical people find it easier to focus their attention on the right sounds in noisy environments. This is shown in a new study from Karolinska Institutet published in the journal Science Advances. The results suggest that music training can be used to sharpen attention and cognition.

This autumn, we’re welcoming the first group of students to our new two-year Master’s Programme in Global Health. This vibrant group of 40 students come from over 20 countries, spanning almost all continents, and a range of backgrounds—law, political science, anthropology, public affairs, medicine, public health, nursing, and more.

The Department of Global Public Health hosted the annual Welcome Day for new students on Wednesday 3 September.

Karolinska Institutet offers all employees fire safety training, that includes both theoretical and practical content. The fire safety training is mandatory for all KI staff and must be undertaken within 6 months from employment, and then repeated every 4:th years.

The prestigious European Society of Coloproctology (ESCP) Tripartite Congress, held in Paris from September 10–12, recognized Professor Anna Martling with the Best Scientific Paper Award.

Researchers have conducted the most extensive study to date on adults who have never had sexual intercourse. The findings, published in PNAS, suggest that lifelong sexlessness is associated with a multifaceted interplay of psychological, social, and genetic factors.

The decision to have a child or not should belong to individuals, not to pollution in their environment, argues Pauliina Damdimopoulou, who studies how the chemicals in our environment affect the ovaries and the egg cells they contain. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October.

The NeurotechEU is gearing up for its annual hackathon!

If you see a need for new infrastructure that would benefit research within ANA Futura, a new process is now launched for applying for funding for shared equipment that is currently not available in ANA Futura’s common laboratories.

Märit Halmin is an intensive care physician and researcher in the research group for Global Disaster Medicine – health needs and interventions at GPH. This summer, she worked at a field hospital in Al-Mawasi, Gaza – an area declared a humanitarian zone but where bombs fell around the clock. For five weeks, she treated seriously injured children and adults. In tents without running water and with a lack of pain relief, every medical intervention became a battle against time and resources.

After two years based at Makerere University in Uganda, Stefan Swartling Peterson has returned to KI with new perspectives on health systems under pressure — from maternal health to the rise of non-communicable diseases and climate-related challenges. Through CESH, the work continues with strengthened collaborations in Kampala.

Meet one of our PhD students at the Department, Joseph Junior Muwonge, in the EPiCSS research group, whose work focuses on improving access to mental healthcare in Sweden. In this interview, he shares what drew him to KI, key findings from his research on socioeconomic and migrant-related disparities, and reflections on his PhD journey so far.

Over 1,300 women are still dying of breast cancer in Sweden every year. Theodoros Foukakis is trying to understand the tumour properties that determine the success of a particular treatment in order to achieve greater therapeutic precision. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October.

Many students were present on the first day of the semester, September 1.

A new study from Karolinska Institutet, published in Nature Communications, reveals that cyclin-dependent kinases (CDK) promote DNA replication licensing in human cells by relieving inhibitory signals from RB tumor suppressor proteins. The findings add a new layer to our understanding of how cancer drugs work and may lead to better targeted cancer therapies in the future.

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet, Uppsala University and Northwestern University have identified a new way to protect the kidney’s blood vessels and reduce tissue damage in chronic kidney disease. The findings are published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

On September 2, we held a kick-off for the Doctoral School in Health Sciences (FiH) with 14 doctoral students, including eight from NVS and the rest from six other departments.

In this newsletter we summarise decisions and ongoing processes regarding research infrastructure at Karolinska Institutet, from January 2025 and up until now. The Infrastructure Board also invites you to a dialogue meeting to discuss current and future needs for of the university's research infrastructure.

The Infrastructure Board at Karolinska Institutet is inviting all researchers to participate in an open dialogue meeting this November, held in both Flemingsberg and Solna, to discuss the current and future needs of the university's research infrastructures.

Flavoured drinks without sugar can be perceived as sweet – and now researchers know why. A new study from Karolinska Institutet, published in the journal Nature Communications, reveals that the brain interprets certain aromas as taste.

Among young people, the use of sleep medication has increased sharply – despite ongoing questions about the drugs’ effectiveness and long-term impact. Researchers now recommend psychological treatment instead.

On Friday 19 September, between 13 and 14, there will be a test and maintenance on the fire detection and alarm system in Neo, including a mandatory evacuation drill, and we kindly ask you to participate in this potentially life-saving exercise.

The walkway between Aula Medica and the MF will be closed off. This is due to ground work that will be carried out over the coming weeks as part of the FM reconstruction.

Heart muscle injury during major surgery and intensive care is common. Michelle Chew studies which patients are at risk and how these injuries can be prevented and treated. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October.

For the eighth time, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research (SSF) has selected Future Research Leaders as part of its prestigious FFL-8 program. Among the 16 chosen researchers is Arvid Guterstam, who will now have the opportunity to further develop his research with a grant of SEK 15 million over a five-year period.

On Thursday, 18 September, technical maintenance will be carried out on the TimeEdit scheduling system.

This means that student schedules and web booking premises will not be available on this day.

When Per Uhlén was fourteen, he ended up in a wheelchair. Since then, he has become a professor, started three companies, and competed in two Paralympic Games. “Sometimes I feel like my life is a film,” he says.

A new study from Karolinska Institutet challenges previous findings that suggested early surgery is more beneficial in the long term than medical treatment for patients with Crohn’s disease. The study replicates a Danish registry study using Swedish data and finds that the results are not comparable. The study was published in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology.

Monday, September 1st, was the opening of the new temporary micro area in BZ, where students can heat their food and store it in a refrigerator on site.

Restaurant Jöns Jacob will be closed for renovations during the autumn semester of 2025. During this period, the microwave area (Mikrotorget) has been temporarily relocated to the entrance hall of the BZ building at Berzelius väg 3, in the former premises of the Medical Bookstore.

A majority of individuals with psychotic disorders who died by suicide in Stockholm County in 2015 had extensive contact with healthcare services and expressed psychosocial difficulties shortly before their deaths. This is revealed in a medical record review study conducted by Region Stockholm and Karolinska Institutet.

It is the spread of tumours, metastases, which is the usual cause of cancer-related death. Jonas Fuxe researchers the mechanisms driving this process, with a focus on how cancer cells interact with their surroundings and mutate in order to take new paths. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October.

Congratulations to Sophie Curbo at the Department of Laboratory Medicine, who was appointed Associate Professor in Microbiology in the medical field at the Docent Committee meeting on August 26, 2025.

Marcus Skribek, postdoc at the Department of Oncology-Pathology and clinical oncologist at Karolinska University Hospital, has been awarded the 2024 Dan Grandér Research Prize for his thesis “Strategies for Optimizing Immune Checkpoint Inhibition in Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer”. The prize is presented annually to the best doctoral thesis in cancer research at Karolinska Institutet.

Thirty Nordic ageing and health researchers will gather in Stockholm on 11–12 September 2025 for the SIA joint senior and junior workshop. Hosted by the Aging Research Center (ARC) at Karolinska Institutet, this event brings together established and early-career experts to foster discussion and collaboration on social inequalities in ageing.

Once again, the Aging Research Center (ARC) at Karolinska Institutet (KI) will host the course titled "Societal and Life-course Perspectives on Inequalities in Aging" this fall semester. The course is arranged in partnership with the Swedish National Graduate School on Ageing and Health (SWEAH, Lund University) and brings together students from various universities throughout Sweden.

Attacks on healthcare are dramatically increasing in conflicts and wars around the world. The Centre for Health Crises continues to highlight this development. On 9 September, KI researchers Märit Halmin and Johan von Schreeb, together with representatives from Médecins Sans Frontières, the Swedish Medical Association, and the Swedish Association of Health Professionals, participated in a meeting at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs to urge Sweden to take clear international responsibility.

One of the national services offered by NBIS/SciLifeLab is the Bioinformatics Peer review Support track (a.k.a. WABI), providing competences in large-scale data analysis for genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, Cryo-EM and other technologies. This support has been enabled by funding from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation, and is part of the SciLifeLab & Wallenberg National Program for Data-Driven Life Science.

Pontus Naucler is hoping to improve the treatment of severe infections while reducing the development of antibiotic resistance by combining data from registries and medical records with AI and clinical studies to make antibiotic treatments more precise. Meet one of the new professors of Karolinska Institutet who will participate in this year's installation ceremony at Aula Medica on 9 October.

We are now making an important change in how we allocate our government research funding. The new model aims to strengthen the university's future and ensure that resources are used where they are most beneficial.

Karolinska Institutet's record-breaking international recruitment of 20 assistant professors focused on excellence has been a great success. With over 2,700 applications from 1,560 researchers in 89 countries, the initiative has had an impact that strengthens KI's position as one of Europe's most attractive medical universities.

Due to ongoing recruitment and parental leave, Purchasing and Public Procurement currently have lower staffing levels.

Today marks World Suicide Prevention Day, an annual event since 2003 aimed at raising awareness about suicide and promoting prevention efforts. Initiated by the WHO and the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP), the day encourages global dialogue and action to reduce stigma and support mental health.