Johanna Lanner, PhD

Dr. Lanner is a preclinical expert in muscle pathophysiology, and her interdisciplinary and translational research program is focused on understanding mechanisms and identifying novel therapeutic interventions to combat muscle dysfunction and weakness. She is an Associate Professor at The Department of Physiology & Pharmacology, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. Her background includes a master’s degree in chemistry from Stockholm University, Sweden, and a PhD in medical sciences from Karolinska Institutet. She did her postdoc training in Professor Susan Hamilton’s laboratory at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, focusing on muscle dysfunction in RYR-1-related diseases.

Johanna has conducted research on different signaling pathways in muscles for over a decade and has made significant advances in this field by characterizing novel mechanisms of muscle weakness and linking oxidative stress and altered muscle metabolism to the impaired contractile function of muscle. She has published over 50 original articles and reviews in leading scientific journals and is frequently invited to present her research at acknowledged scientific conferences and congresses. Dr. Lanner is the recipient of national and European grants, and her research team recently identified a mitochondrial protein that potentially can be targeted to improve muscle function in genetic diseases and non-communicable disorders.