The Molecular Medicine Partnership Unit (MMPU) is an alliance between the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and the Medical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg. Its primary aim is to uncover the molecular basis of disease and to speed the transformation of biomedical discoveries into personalized medicine strategies.
Founded in 2002, the MMPU currently comprises nine international research teams. The MMPU is co-directed by Prof. Andreas Kulozik from the Angelika-Lautenschläger Hospital for Children and Adolescents at the University of Heidelberg and by Prof. Matthias Hentze from EMBL, and is housed in the Otto-Meyerhof-Research Center on the Medical Campus of the University of Heidelberg, Germany.
Research themes place emphasis on common diseases, particularly blood disorders, cancer, chronic lung diseases (in particular cystic fibrosis), iron metabolism disorders, chronic pain, diseases associated with aging, and AIDS.
In 2017 more than 120 scientists from across the world work on these nine research themes:
‘Diseases of mRNA metabolism’, headed by Andreas Kulozik and Matthias Hentze
‘Cystic fibrosis/Chronic airway disease’, headed by Marcus Mall and Carsten Schultz
‘Pathogenesis of colorectal cancer and development of novel approaches for early detection, diagnosis and prevention’, headed by Magnus von Knebel Doeberitz and Peer Bork
‘Iron homeostasis in health and disease’, headed by Martina Muckenthaler and Matthias Hentze
‘Early warning signals of aging in human stem cells’ headed by Anthony D. Ho and Anne-Claude Gavin.
‘Interfering with assembly and maturation of infectious HIV-1’ headed by Hans-Georg Kräusslich and John Briggs.
‘Molecular mediators of chronic pain’ headed by Rohini Kuner, Paul Heppenstall and Jan Siemens.
‘Molecular Pediatric Oncology’ headed by Andreas Kulozik and Jan Korbel.
‘Systems Medicine of Cancer Drugs’ headed by Sascha Dietrich and Wolfgang Huber.
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Altamura, S; Kessler, R; Gröne, N; et al. (2014). "Resistance of ferroportin to hepcidin binding causes exocrine pancreatic failure and fatal iron overload". Cell Metab. 20 (2): 359–67. doi:10.1016/j.cmet.2014.07.007. PMID 25100063.
Trojanek, JB; Cobos-Correa, A; Diemer, S; et al. (2014). "Airway mucus obstruction triggers macrophage activation and matrix metalloproteinase 12-dependent emphysema". Am J Respir Cell Mol Biol. 51 (5): 709–20. doi:10.1165/rcmb.2013-0407OC. PMID 24828142.
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