NLS Profiles

Despite international turbulence and news of life sciences and research funding disruptions in the U.S., investment in innovative life sciences projects continues, according to Mala Valroy, an investment manager with Industrifonden, one of Sweden’s largest evergreen venture capital (VC) funds. 


For Sirpa and Markku Jalkanen of Finland, M.D. and Ph.D., married, immunotherapy researchers, working together came as naturally as a courtship.

Victor Ambros, Professor of Molecular Medicine and the Silverman Chair in Natural Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, is one of this year’s winners of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

More than three decades after their discovery of microRNA, Professor Gary Ruvkun received the “mythic call” from Stockholm to learn that he’d been awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine alongside his erstwhile colleague Victor Ambros.

Anna Wedell, Professor and Research Group Leader of the group Inborn Errors of Endocrinology and Metabolism at Karolinska Institutet and Director of the new Precision Medicine Center Karolinska, explains how research in rare diseases has evolved due to new technologies, and emphasizes that identifying synergies is essential for diagnosing and treating these conditions.

Fertram Sigurjonsson spent his boyhood summers in a fish factory in Isafjordur, then built a career in prosthetics and amputation prevention. Putting the two together led him to found Kerecis, which turns cod skin into medical products for severe wounds. In 2023 the company was sold to Coloplast for up to USD 1.3 billion, making it one of Iceland’s first unicorns.