News archive

Karolinska Institutet maintains a strong position in several areas in QS (Quacquarelli Symonds) international subject rankings for universities. In the subject area Medicine, KI is ranked number seven globally, up from number twelve last year. KI also strengthens its position in the subject areas Biological Sciences, Nursing, Pharmacy and Pharmacology, and Psychology.

Professor Christian Giske has been appointed deputy chairperson of the Committee for Research effective immediately, following a decision by KI’s president. His mandate runs until Dec. 31, 2025.

Researchers at Karolinska Institutet, Department of Medicine, Solna, identified HOXC13-AS, a human skin-specific long noncoding RNA (lncRNA), that plays a crucial role in epidermal differentiation. The study is published in the journal Cell Death & Differentiation, highlighting lncRNA's physiological importance in the epidermal barrier's maintenance and reconstruction.

There are clear regional differences in the proportion of older adults receiving potentially inappropriate drug treatment in Sweden. In a study published in Frontiers of Pharmacology, researchers at Karolinska Institutet examine regional differences over time and show that these regional variations have decreased over the past decade.

Caregivers want patients to feel cared for. This, according to a new doctoral thesis from Karolinska Institutet, is one reason why they still give treatments that provide no benefit.

A nationwide Swedish study including over 10,000 cases of cholesteatoma, a lesion in the middle ear, shows a strong hereditary component to the disease.

Researchers at the Department of Oncology-Pathology have together with researchers from The European Molecular Biology Laboratory published a paper in Nature Chemical Biology where they developed a method that can identify important differences between proteins in an unbiased way.

Just over two years ago, Arne Persson had a bad fall while walking his dog in the woods. He struck his coccyx badly but was able to get home. The pain just grew and grew over the next few days, so in the end he went to A&E at the hospital. After an X-ray, he was sent home because nothing was broken. This article is part of an in-depth feature from KI's popular science magazine Medicinsk Vetenskap.

While there are currently a dozen approved AI systems for breast cancer screening, it has been difficult to evaluate their clinical performance objectively. Now, however, there is a Swedish validation platform ready to compare how well AI systems detect signs of breast cancer – and its development has been led by researchers at Karolinska Institutet.

Petra Kormo’s second baby was born on Wednesday, 4 January 2017. Everything went well with the birth, but Petra developed a fever after she arrived home. She felt weaker and sicker for every day that passed. This article is part of an in-depth feature from KI's popular science magazine Medicinsk Vetenskap.

Sepsis has a way of flying under the radar. Public awareness of the life-threatening disease is low, and official statistics are misleading. Now researchers are using special alarm systems and AI to increase detection. This article is part of an in-depth feature from KI's popular science magazine Medicinsk Vetenskap.

Barbro Westerholm passed away on 13 March. She was born in Stockholm in 1933 and graduated with a medical degree from Karolinska Institutet in 1959. She then went on to earn her PhD in 1964 with a thesis on the in vitro release of histamine and 5-hydroxy tryptamine before becoming a docent at KI. She is known for being the director general of the National Board of Health and Welfare from 1979 to 1985 and for her engagement with HBTQI issues and the elderly, the “year-rich”.

Men who played football (soccer) in the Swedish top division until the mid 1900s had a higher risk of dementia than men from the general population, a new study from Karolinska Institutet published in The Lancet Public Health reports.

Region Stockholm has launched a new action plan for precision medicine in the region. The plan, which was devised in consultation with Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital, will allow more patients to benefit from the research being done in the field of precision medicine.

A new study published in Nature reports that a technology known as spatial omics can be used to map simultaneously how genes are switched on and off and how they are expressed in different areas of tissues and organs. This improved technology, developed by researchers at Yale University and Karolinska Institutet, could shed light on the development of tissues, as well as on certain diseases and how to treat them.

Immunotherapy is an effective form of therapy for different types of cancer. However, for pancreatic cancer, its effect is limited and differs between men and women. Researchers at Karolinska Institutet have now found a possible explanation for this sex difference. The study, which is published in Cancer Research, reveals the presence of an immune cell in women with pancreatic cancer that obstructs the body’s immune response. The results can pave the way for a more sex-specific treatment.

During the pandemic, it became clear that children who contracted COVID-19 became less ill than adults. One hypothesis has been that common colds would give children immunity protecting against a severe form of the disease. Researchers at Karolinska Institutet are now able to show that OC43, one of the coronaviruses that cause common colds, boosts the immune response to COVID-19. The study, which is published in PNAS, could give rise to more tailored vaccine programmes for children and adults.

Two out of two audited specialist nursing programmes at Karolinska Institutet received a “high quality” rating in an evaluation by the Swedish Higher Education Authority (UKÄ) published on March 9. The specialisations are pre-hospital nursing and psychiatric care.

Readership of news articles written by KI researchers for The Conversation jumped 62 percent on the year in 2022. Since KI became a member two years ago, 43 researchers have penned over 42 articles, reaching around 3.8 million readers worldwide. “I have never experienced such a response to my research before,” says postdoc Filip Gedin.

A clinical study by researchers at Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital shows that the hunger hormone ghrelin can increase the heart’s pump capacity in patients with heart failure. The results have been published in the European Heart Journal.

A new study from Karolinska Institutet suggests that electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), lithium, and clozapine may reduce suicide rates in adolescent men with severe mental illness, consistent with previous findings in adults. The study, published in Nature Communications, compared treatment and suicide rates across different regions in Sweden.

Eighteen kidney researchers at Karolinska Institutet have been allocated grants totaling 3.2 million Swedish kronor from the Swedish Kidney Foundation, an announcement made in connection with World Kidney Day on March 9.

Katie Healy at the Department of Dental Medicine and Sebastian Ols at the Department of Medicine in Solna, receive the Sven Gard's scholarship 2023. Sven Gard's scholarship is awarded annually for the best dissertation in virology. The scholarship takes place as a result of nomination.

KI Professor Maria Bradley is awarded the Medicine Doctor Axel Hirsch prize 2023 for her breadth of research and for her remarkable efforts in the field of atopic eczema.

Karolinska Institutet has been awarded a new EU prize for its long-term commitment to gender equality in higher education. The prize of 100,000 euro is the result of nearly 40 years of sustained activity to advance equal opportunities. The efforts have paid off and now KI is recognized as a role model for equality, a “Gender Equality Champion.”

Competing risks and multi-state models allow us to study complex disease settings and answer composite research questions and should be used more widely in epidemiology.

Immunotherapy has been shown to greatly improve survival rates for certain types of cancer. However, in some cases, it can lead to an over-activation of the immune system, which can be dangerous. In a recent review by researchers at Karolinska Institutet, potential therapies have been identified, which might make it possible to continue with immunotherapy even when facing severe side effects.

In a study entitled "Bacterial Meningitis in Africa", recently published in Frontiers in Neurology as part of the Research Topic "Neuroimmunology in Africa", researchers raise awareness of strides and recommendations in the diagnosis, management and prevention of bacterial meningitis.

Several KI researchers are part of an international project that has been awarded nearly $15 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, with $1 million co-funding from the Swedish government. The project involves a multi-country study to better understand the burden of Human papillomavirus (HPV) among girls and women in low and lower middle-income countries.

Modern research often uses high-tech methods and tools that require particular expertise. Despite this, there has been no career paths in Sweden for individuals interested in the technical and methodological development needed to operate and develop the research infrastructures of the future. Starting April 1, 2023, such a career path will be available at KI, possibly the first of its kind in the country.

Mats Hallgren receives a grant of 3 930 000 SEK for the project “Post covid-19 as a threat to healthy ageing: a randomized controlled trial of yoga to improve quality of life”.

Being on parental leave is protective against poorer mental health particularly among mothers, with evidence of this beneficial effect continuing in later life, according to a systematic review in The Lancet Public Health.

Researchers at the Thoracic Surgery research group, the Department of Molecular Medicine and Surgery, have performed a nation-wide study of patients who underwent bioprosthetic aortic valve replacement in Sweden between 2003 and 2018. The study is published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, JACC, and shows that it is less dangerous than previously believed to receive a small bioprosthetic aortic valve in relation to the patients size.

KI Professor Rickard Sandberg has been awarded the Torsten Söderberg Academy Professorship in Medicine by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, a donation of 10 million Swedish kronor for a five-year period. Rickard Sandberg has developed methods that make it possible to deeply penetrate the human genome by studying genes in individual cells.

Maja Fjaestad is the latest in a line of expert coordinators that have been recruited to the Centre for Health Crises at KI. The LIME-researcher and former under-secretary of state will work in the expert field of policy and preparedness. She looks forward to contributing with a holistic outlook when it comes to health threats.

Zarina Kabir, docent at the Division of Nursing, has been awarded 4 250 000 SEK from Forte for the project "m-Health based intervention by community workers to support family caregivers to persons with dementia living at home".

Rumours spread faster than ever nowadays thanks to social media, and it is easy to get carried away. Some people are also inherently more vulnerable to conspiracy theories. However, sceptics’ concerns should be addressed, not dismissed, say researchers who are studying people’s willingness to take different kinds of vaccines.

With the help of a multi-language smartphone app, parents in Sweden were able to give their young children better dietary habits and less screen time, a study by researchers from Karolinska Institutet published in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity reports.

Karolinska Institutet has decided to make Wilhelmina Hoffman, specialist in geriatric medicine, and economist Fredrik Lundberg honorary doctors. The formal ceremony will take place in connection with the doctoral conferment ceremony at Stockholm City Hall on 12 May.

A new study published in BMC Public Health, shows that screening in schools can improve psychotic symptoms in adolescents. The study is partly produced by researcher at the National centre for suicide research and prevention at Karolinska Institutet.

Next-generation sequencing studies have in recent years revealed numerous recurrently mutated genes in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). These mutations are usually found in a relatively small percentage of cases and associated with poor clinical outcome.

Our newest team member Irene Wanyana joins the Department of Global Public to pursue her PhD. In her research project titled Multisectoral Approaches to Sustainable Health in Uganda, A focus on the role of climatic variabilities on maternal and child health, Irene aims to explore the linkages that exist between health and other Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in Uganda.

Jenny Mjösberg, Professor of Tissue Immunology at Karolinska Institutet, is one of five researchers to be awarded the Göran Gustafsson Prize this year. The prize is intended for young researchers in medicine, molecular biology, chemistry, physics and mathematics and is awarded by the Göran Gustafsson Foundations in collaboration with the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

A team of researchers at Karolinska Institutet, SciLifeLab and Karolinska University Hospital will receive a total of 14.7 million Swedish kronor from the Swedish Research Council (VR). The four-year grant is part of the council’s push to increase accessibility to research infrastructure and will involve making available new technologies for clinical studies in precision medicine.

Three questions to Tessa Schillemans, Unit of Unit of Cardiovascular and Nutritional Epidemiology at the Institute of Environmental Medicine (IMM)

The new president of Karolinska Institutet, Annika Östman Wernerson, is professor of renal and transplantation science and has a passion for pedagogical research. Internal culture and building ‘one KI’ by strengthening the dialogue and communication between management, departments, staff and students is one of her biggest driving forces. [The interview was published in spring 2023 when the university management took office.]

Martin Bergö does not want to make drastic changes. As KI’s new vice-president, he plans to first tidy his desk, then team up with the new president, Annika Östman Wernerson, and listen to what the organisation has to say. “We’ll be tackling the most important issues together, such as establishing a good internal dialogue.” [The interview was published in spring 2023 when the university management took office.]

Inflammatory diseases have complex disease mechanisms that can differ from patient to patient with the same diagnosis. This means that currently available drugs have little effect on many patients. Using so-called digital twins, researchers at Karolinska Institutet have now obtained a deeper understanding of the “off and on” proteins that control these diseases. The study, which is published in Cell Reports Medicine, can lead to more personalised drug therapies.

Child obesity is linked to increased risk of developing diabetes in adulthood, both autoimmune forms of diabetes and different forms of type 2 diabetes, a new study published in Diabetologia reports. The risk of developing the most insulin-resistant form of diabetes is, for example, three times as high in children with obesity.

An online anonymous cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) treatment program for individuals with a sexual interest in children showed good results in an English language pilot study. Now the CBT program for crime prevention also opens in Swedish, German, and Portuguese. The treatment program, which has been developed by researchers and psychologists at Karolinska Institutet, will be evaluated within the framework of an international research collaboration funded by the EU.