Professor Klaus Rajewsky Awarded Honorary Medal in Weimar
In his lecture given in conjunction with the award presentation, Professor Rajewsky described how he and his student Hua Gu, in collaboration with Jamey Marth, Vancouver, Canada, developed the conditional mutagenesis technique in mice in the 1990s.
By inactivating or activating individual genes in a cell type specific manner in living animals, Rajewsky and his collaborators explored their impact on signaling pathways in normal and malignant cells of the immune system. Today this technique is considered one of the most important methods to track the function of genes and their role in the development of diseases, and it is used in biomedical research laboratories worldwide.
With the medal, the Society also recognized Professor Rajewsky’s groundbreaking research on the development and function of the B cells, the antibody “factories” of the immune system, and their transformation into tumor cells. In his laboratory in Cologne back in the mid-nineties together with his student Ralf Küppers and the pathologist Martin-Leo Hansmann, he succeeded in identifying germinal center B cells as the progenitors of Hodgkin’s lymphoma, the most common cancer of the lymphatic system.
His long-term goal to combine his two special fields, mouse genetics and immunology, resulted in the development of conditional mouse models for human B cell lymphomas, in particular for Burkitt’s lymphoma and Hodgkin’s disease.
Through his intensive research work over five decades, Professor Klaus Rajewsky has educated and inspired an entire generation of scientists in diverse areas of biomedical research.
The STS was founded in 1998 as a joint endeavor by the spokespersons of the three study groups of the German Society for Immunology (DGFI), the German Society for Cell Biology (DGZ) and the Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (GBM) to provide an interdisciplinary exchange forum for scientists of various fields.
Since 2010 it has awarded the Honorary Medal to outstanding scientists for achievements in deciphering signaling processes in normal and transformed cells. The previous Honorary Medal recipients were Professor Tony Pawson (Mount Sinai Hospital, Toronto, Canada, 2010), Professor Tony Hunter (Salk Institute, La Jolla, USA, 2011) and Professor Carl-Hendrik Hedlin (Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, Uppsala, Sweden, 2012).
Only recently, in June of this year at the 18th Annual Meeting of the European Hematology Association in Stockholm, Sweden, Professor Rajewsky was awarded the José Carreras Award 2013 for his outstanding achievements. On this occasion he also gave an award lecture.
Professor Klaus Rajewsky (Photo: David Ausserhofer/Copyright: MDC)
Contact:
Barbara Bachtler
Press Department
Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) Berlin-Buch
in the Helmholtz Association
Robert-Rössle-Straße 10
13125 Berlin, Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 30 94 06 — 38 96
Fax: +49 (0) 30 94 06 — 38 33
e‑mail: presse@mdc-berlin.de
http://www.mdc-berlin.de/
Further information:
Signal Transduction Society (STS)
Professor Dr. Ottmar Janssen
Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel
Universitätsklinikum Schleswig-Holstein
Institute for Immunology
Arnold-Heller-Str. 3, Haus 17
24105 Kiel, Germany
Phone: +49 (0) 431 597 — 33 77
e‑mail: Ottmar.Janssen@uksh.de
http://www.sigtrans.de
