The International Biomedical Research Alliance’s Outstanding Recent Graduate Award was created to recognize the noteworthy and distinctive achievements of an individual who has graduated from the NIH Oxford-Cambridge Scholars Program within the last two years. The honoree embodies the values of scientific innovation and collaboration leading to seminal biomedical discoveries at an early stage in their career. This year, the Outstanding Recent Graduate Award was bestowed upon Dr. Kristoffer Haurum Johansen.
Kristoffer Haurum Johansen was a Wellcome Trust-NIH-Cambridge PhD Scholar in the Class of 2017, with mentors Dr. Pam Schwartzberg at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease and Professor Klaus Okkenhaug at the University of Cambridge.
Kristoffer has been an exemplar, both in tackling the challenges of working across two labs on two continents and more importantly, taking full advantage of the benefits the NIH OxCam Scholars Program offers.
Kristoffer designed a CRISPR screen that targets all known and suspected PIP3-binding proteins in the genome, with one of the key target genes identified being RASA3. These are potential effectors of the PI3K pathway which not only is essential for normal immune function but also among the most frequently activated in cancer and metabolic processes. RASA3 is unique among known PIP3 effectors to be negatively regulated by PI3K. Through his PhD, he mastered techniques including bioinformatics, molecular biology, gene-editing, in vivo infection and immunization models, imaging, flow cytometry, and biochemistry. Kristoffer published his work reporting the CRISPR screen and RASA3 phenotyping in Science Signaling which was featured on the cover and was highlighted by Science. Based on his work he has won a prestigious Fellowship from the Danish Lundbeckfonden where he will apply the techniques, he learned during his PhD to engineer more effective T cells to fight cancer.
“I have had the pleasure of visiting Kristoffer’s lab in Denmark and am delighted to see him developing a career as a leading innovative and independent researcher with great support from his current mentor, Sine Reker Hadrup, a world leader in the analysis of the TCR repertoires of tumour reactive T cells. Kristoffer brought CRISPR technology to the lab and is devising very clever methods for CRISPR screening and to modify T cells for adoptive cell therapy,” remarked Prof Klaus Okkenhaug.
“Throughout his work, it was a pleasure to watch Kristoffer grow as a scientist. He is bright, hardworking, independent, and creative and thinks deeply about his work and that of others. His work has wide-ranging implications for understanding immune cell trafficking in response to immunization, infection, and cancer. Finally, I would like to comment that Kristoffer is truly a delight to work with—friendly, helpful, generous, and conscientious, with high standards. I have had multiple outstanding students in my laboratory, including Jay Debnath, now chair of Pathology at UCSF; Edward M. Schaeffer now chair of Urology at Northwestern and more recently Roseanne Zhao, now a fellow in Mike Diamond’s lab. Kris is among the best of them. It is a pleasure and an honor to have worked with him, and both Klaus Okkenhaug and I highly recommend him for this award,” stated Dr. Pam Schwartzberg.
On being honored with this award Dr. Johansen remarked “I am deeply humbled and honored to receive this award and would like to express my gratitude to the International Biomedical Research Alliance for supporting the programme. My PhD studies were greatly enriched by new friendships with my fellow students, each of whom has contributed exceptional work in their respective fields. Lastly, I would like to give a heartfelt thank you to my fantastic supervisors, Professor Klaus Okkenhaug, and Dr. Pamela L. Schwartzberg, who have supported me immensely on this journey.”
Congratulations Kristoffer!