ESP Biography

Brief Biographical Sketch:

For my PhD thesis in Sweden I investigated synaptic signaling in brain. Towards the end of my PhD I had become interested in neurodegeneration and for my postdoc I decided to come to the U.S. to join the Andreasson lab at Stanford in 2007. I study inflammation in brain mediated by immune cells called microglia in Alzheimer’s Disease. Alzheimer’s Disease is the most common form of dementia where patients lose their cognitive functions and there is currently no cure available. Microglia cells however also have very good functions such as removing the amyloid plaques that accumulate in the brains of Alzheimer patients and providing trophic support for nerve cells that are dying because of the plaques and the associated inflammation. The goal is to dampen the damaging inflammation while increasing the beneficial functions of microglia. I think there is nothing more fascinating than the brain and the role of the immune system in the brain!

Past Classes