Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland (FIMM)

26/09/2025

The Young Investigator of the Month honor at FIMM highlights a FIMM doctoral or postdoctoral researcher each month for a recent significant accomplishment.

The Young Investigators for August 2025 are Kira Detrois and Tuomo Hartonen. Warm congratulations for their recent Nature Genetics publication, “Cross-biobank generalizability and accuracy of electronic health record-based predictors compared to polygenic scores”! 🎉

Kira is a doctoral researcher in the Data Science and Genetic Epidemiology lab led by Andrea Ganna. She has a background in Computer Science and Bioinformatics, which provides a foundation in both data science and computational methods, as well as biology and medicine.

Tuomo is working at the intersection of machine learning, health and genomics. His approach is to apply machine learning to real-world data, acknowledging the real-world limitations and problems such as incomplete data, privacy issues and model fairness. He currently works as an Academy of Finland Research Fellow at FIMM, leading the Machine Learning for Health (ML4HEALTH) team.

25/09/2025

This week, FIMM had the pleasure of hosting colleagues with different research administration roles from across the Nordic EMBL Partnership for Molecular Medicine at the beautiful Tvärminne Zoological Station, a marine station of the University of Helsinki located at the entrance to the Gulf of Finland.

We spent 1.5 days planning and working together, with a special focus on our NORPOD postdoctoral programme activities.

Alongside the productive sessions, we also enjoyed the best of Finnish traditions: a nature trail walk, sauna, and even a refreshing dip in the sea. Many thanks to all participants!

22/09/2025

Upcoming FIMM dissertation! 🏛️

MSc Hannes Bode will defend his doctoral dissertation "Epigenetics of Environmental Risk Factors for Breast Cancer in Cancer-Discordant Twin Pairs" in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Helsinki, on 1 October 2025 at 14:00.

💡 Breast cancer is the most common cancer affecting women worldwide. This thesis aimed to advance our understanding of breast cancer risk by providing new insights into the complex interplay between DNA methylation and environmental and behavioral factors.

Using a twin design, this research demonstrates that DNA methylation patterns can reflect breast cancer risk years before diagnosis. The study also confirmed the significant and long-lasting impact of exposure to stressful life events on breast cancer risk.

These findings provide a valuable framework for future research on new breast cancer screening and prevention strategies utilizing DNA methylation markers.

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The public examination will take place in the lecture hall 1 of Haartman Institute, Haartmaninkatu 3, Helsinki.

Associate Professor Mette Sørensen, University of Southern Denmark, will serve as the opponent, and Adjunct Professor Tuomas Mirtti as the custos. The thesis has been supervised by Professor Jaakko Kaprio and Adjunct Professor Miina Ollikainen.

Welcome!

Event 🔗: https://lnkd.in/d4S6aEzN

E-thesis: https://lnkd.in/du8k4esd

12/09/2025

🎙️ New podcast alert: The Genetics Podcast, Episode 204: "Bringing cardiovascular genetics and biobank discoveries into the clinic" with FIMM Director Samuli Ripatti

In this episode, Prof. Ripatti discusses recent research at FIMM on cardiovascular genetics, polygenic risk scores, and the role of the FinnGen study in bridging research and clinical practice. He provides insights into:

🟢 how polygenic risk scores are being integrated into care for cardiovascular disease and breast cancer

🟢 the use of medication history in FinnGen to uncover cardiometabolic genetics and to predict treatment patterns

🟢 what comes next: proteomics, deeper phenotyping, using biobank studies to refine prognosis and guide therapy

If you're interested in biobank research, genetic epidemiology, or how we can translate genetics into better health, this is for you.

🔗 Listen here: https://pod.fo/e/328c49

11/09/2025

The FIMM-EMBL International PhD Programme has become a cornerstone of FIMM's mission to train the next generation of scientists.

The programme begins with a rotation system, where students spend six to nine months working with several FIMM research groups before choosing one in which to pursue their full doctoral studies. This structure fosters broad scientific training, exposure to cutting-edge technologies and valuable connections both within FIMM and across the wider EMBL network.

Five talented new doctoral researchers joined the programme in August. We warmly welcome Assel Kalmenova, Sara Štebe, Anna Vainio, Aarti Venkatesan and Yining Wang to FIMM!

Meet the newest members of the FIMM-EMBL PhD Programme and hear what inspires them as they embark on their doctoral journey:

Now in its 16th year, the FIMM-EMBL International PhD Programme has become a cornerstone of FIMM's mission to train the next generation of scientists. We are delighted to have five talented new doctoral researchers join the programme this autumn. Let's find out who they are!

10/09/2025

Single-cell multiplex imaging: a powerful tool for digital pathology

Multiplex imaging can play a critical role in unravelling the tumour microenvironment. This approach provides the possibility of extracting information from human tissue samples by visualising many more biomarkers than traditional microscopy.

Healthcare-in-europe.com platform recently published a summary of the presentation Dr. Teijo Pellinen from FIMM gave during the 36th European Congress of Pathology.

In his presentation, Dr. Pellinen indicated that understanding the diverse cell states and molecular composition within the tumour microenvironment is crucial for improving risk stratification and predicting therapy responses.

Read more about the methodology and the pan-cancer multiplex tumour microenvironment project aiming to profile over 40,000 tissue samples recently launched at FIMM from this article:
https://healthcare-in-europe.com/en/news/single-cell-multiplex-imaging-digital-pathology.html

03/09/2025

Are you looking for a PhD at the intersection of machine learning and health sciences?

The Machine Learning for Health team at FIMM led by Dr. Tuomo Hartonen is looking for a Doctoral Researcher to join this interdisciplinary team.

The team develops and applies advanced machine models to analyze health data from national databases in Europe. They focus on applying AI methods to derive meaningful insights from large, real-world health and biomedical datasets.

Read more and submit your application by the end of September:

🔗 https://jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki-Doctoral-researcher-in-generative-AI-for-population-health/828287802/

29/08/2025

The Young Investigator of the Month honor at FIMM highlights a FIMM doctoral or postdoctoral researcher each month for a recent significant accomplishment.

The Young Investigator for July 2025 is Stephanie Zellers. Warm congratulations to her for her recent publications in Social Science & Medicine and Royal Society of Open Science. 🎉

Stephanie is a postdoctoral researcher in the Kaprio Group. She leverages unique "natural experiments" based on Finnish register data, alongside twin and family designs to understand causal influences of environmental exposures on behavior and health.

In addition to her main research line, she is active in European networks to improve reproducibility and rigor in science, with a particular focus on equity, diversity, and inclusion.

https://www.helsinki.fi/en/hilife-helsinki-institute-life-science/units/fimm/training-fimm/young-investigators-month

27/08/2025

🔬 New genetic discovery from FIMM and NCMBM: MAP4K1 as a key regulator of immune balance

Researchers from FIMM and the Norwegian Centre for Molecular Biosciences and Medicine (NCMBM) have identified MAP4K1 as a novel gene behind immune dysregulation. The study, published in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, shows that loss of MAP4K1 amplifies T cell responses, leading to recurrent episodes of fever and inflammation.

This Nordic EMBL Partnership for Molecular Medicine collaboration led by Janna Saarela and Meri Kaustio combined genomic analysis, functional immunology and CRISPR-based validation to uncover how HPK1, the gene product of MAP4K1, acts as a brake on T cell activation and function.

The findings not only help patients with this rare immune disorder, but may also provide insights relevant to autoimmunity, common inflammatory diseases and cancer immunotherapy.

Researchers uncover how loss of a gene called MAP4K1 amplifies T cell responses, offering insights into immune disorders and potential therapies.

18/08/2025

The Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences of the University of Helsinki invites applications for the position of

🟢 ASSISTANT PROFESSOR / ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR / PROFESSOR OF HUMAN GENETICS AND GENOMICS 🟢

with a possibility of a secondary affiliation with FIMM.

The successful applicant may be appointed to a fixed-term assistant / associate professorship, or to a full professorship depending on the applicant’s qualifications and career stage.

Read more and apply by Oct 10:
https://jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki-Assistant-Professor-Associate-Professor-or-Professor-of-Human-Genetics-and-Genomics/827409602/

06/08/2025

🧬 Twin Study: Is Humor Production in Our Genes?

New paper co-authored by FIMM researchers Dr. Stephanie Zellers and Professor Jaakko Kaprio is the first twin study to explore the genetic and environmental contributions to humor production: the skill of creating humor that makes others laugh.

By analyzing responses from over 600 twin pairs in the UK, the researchers found that while other aspects of humor may have some heritable component, the capacity to produce humor appears to be primarily shaped by environmental factors.

The study was done in collaboration with Dr. Gil Greengross, Dr. Paul Silvia and Professor Nancy Segal, who recently wrote a blog post about the study findings for the Psychology Today.

Read more:

Link to the blog post:
🔗 https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/twofold/202507/is-humor-in-our-genes

Link to the original publication:
https://doi.org/10.1017/thg.2025.10010

31/07/2025

Relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML) remains difficult to treat.

Combination therapies can improve patient outcomes, but the massive number of possible drug combinations vastly exceeds what could be tested in clinical trials or patient cells.

In a recent article published in Cancer Research, a team led by Professor Tero Aittokallio developed an experimental-computational approach that leverages single-cell transcriptomics and single-agent response profiles from primary patient samples.

The method pinpoints targeted drug combinations that selectively co-inhibit treatment-resistant cancer cells in each AML patient sample to propose personalised, safe and effective therapies.

"We observed that cell type compositions evolve dynamically between the diagnostic and relapsed/refractory stages uniquely in each patient, hence requiring personalized drug combination strategies to target therapy-resistant cancer cells”, says the first author of the study, Doctoral Researcher Yingjia Chen from FIMM.

The study was done in collaboration with researchers from Helsinki University Hospital, University of Helsinki (FIMM, HiLIFE and Faculty of Medicine), iCAN Digital Precision Cancer Medicine Flagship project, and Biotech Research and Innovation Centre (BRIC) of the University of Copenhagen.

Researchers developed a systematic combinatorial design strategy that uses machine learning to prioritize the most promising drug combinations for relapsed/refractory acute myeloid leukemia. It integrates single-cell transcriptomics and single-agent response data to propose personalized, safe and ef...