Friday June 20, the Kirsten and Freddy Johansen Foundation presented its two annual prizes for preclinical and clinical research at the Univ. Copenhagen Ceremonial Hall.
We are proud to announce that Prof. Gitte Moos Knudsen is the recipient of this year's prestigious clinical award. The award comes with a prize of 1.75 million DKK, where 250.000 DKK is personal and the rest is for research.
The two award winners were celebrated at a festive event in the Ceremonial Hall at Frue Plads, where Dean Bente Merete Stallknecht participated, together with representatives and board members from the Kirsten and Freddy Johansen Foundation, as well as previous award recipients.
On receiving the clinical award, Gitte Moos Knudsen says:
"The award is a huge recognition of the research that my research group and I have carried out over a number of years, as well as for my organisations, Rigshospitalet and the University of Copenhagen, as well as the many foundations that have supported my research over the years. Personally, it is a special joy for me and my family and a recognition of how much of one's time it takes to conduct research at a high level."
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Kristian Larsen has received 250.000 DKK from Desirée and Niels Ydes Foundation to partly cover his salary in the project 'LSD treatment effects on cognitive brain function in depression'.
The LSD projectapplies human brain imaging to understand how LSD affects brain function in patients with depression, focusing on working memory, the mental ability to temporarily hold and manipulate information. This cognitive function is often impaired in depression, so determining how LSD affects these brain processes helps to reveal the brain pathways supporting this promising treatment.
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Congratulations to Gitte Moos Knudsen who has received 4.432.749 DKK in support from DFF for the project 'Sleep, brain oscillations, and brain microstructure in mild traumatic brain injury'.
The project will be initiated August 1, 2025 and will last 4 years.
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Following a review of articles published in 2024, the board of the Danish Society for Affective Disorders (DSAL) has awarded “Affekten” (https://sites.google.com/view/danselforafflid/home/affekten) to Søren Vinther Larsen for the article titled “Association Between Intrauterine System Hormone Dosage and Depression Risk” (https://psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/appi.ajp.20230909).
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The 2024 NRU annual report has been published and is available for download (in a low-resolution version) here.
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Gitte Moos Knudsen has received 748.357 DKK in support from Toyota-Fonden for a powerful GPU server to be installed at NRU.
The server is to be used for the analysis of brain imaging data using new AI-based methods.
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NRU was represented at the annual meeting of the Danish Society of Psychiatry (DSP) by professor Vibe Frøkjær, postdocs Søren Vinther Larsen and Kristian R. Jensen, together with Master's students Kamilla G. Nielsen, Randi T. Kjær, and Jonas Kendal. Søren Vinther Larsen was awarded 1st Prize at the Pontoppidan Lecture Competition for young researchers for his presentation "Effect of oral contraception on serotonin 4 receptor binding and verbal memory: a randomized, placebo-controlled trial". Congratulations to Søren!
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NRU PhD student Clara Madsen has received an award for the second best poster at this year's NeuroGrad Winter School which was held Jan 20-21 at Marienlyst Badehotel. Clara's poster was entitled 'Cerebral serotonin 2A receptor occupancy and behavioral effects of classic serotonergic psychedelic drugs in pigs'.
The yearly three-day NeuroGrad Winter School is designed to stimulate networking between PhD students affiliated with the graduate program in neurosciences (NeuroGrad) at University of Copenhagen. It offers a chance for the PhD students to present and discuss their project with other PhD students. Furthermore, the graduate students will obtain transferable skills relevant to the stage of progress of their PhD study and project.
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We are thrilled to announce that Melanie Ganz-Benjaminsen has received 20 mio DKK in a Lundbeck Foundation Collaborative project grant for the 5-year project “Developing TRUSTMIND: AI in Mental Health”. The project will be carried out in collaboration with Prof Aasa Feragen from DTU Compute at Denmark's Technical University (DTU) and Prof Merete Osler from Center for Clinical Research and Prevention at Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospitals (CCRP-RH) and Institute of Public Health at the University of Copenhagen.
Read more about the project and the grant via the following two links:
Lundbeck Foundation news and LinkedIn post from Melanie.
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Congratulations to both Vibe G. Frøkjær and Søren Vinther Larsen for each receiving a grant from Læge Sofus Carl Emil Friis og hustru Olga Doris Friis Legat.
Vibe has received 1.210.000 DKK in support for her project "Promoting women's mental health by identifying markers of hormone-sensitive depression?", while Søren has received 500.000 DKK in support for his project "Hormonal sensitivity and brain biology: Do oral contraceptives distort serotonergic brain signaling?"
About Vibe's project:
In this project, we will leverage novel data from a set of existing cohorts to identify common epigenetic signatures among women undergoing two different types of hormonal shifts (pregnancy to post- partum, starting a hormonal contraceptive) and with different risk factors (e.g. absence/presence of early life trauma) and evaluate whether these signatures map onto a spectrum of depressive-like symptoms or not. This will allow us for the first time to develop a molecular biomarker of hormone sensitive depression and to provide a clinical tool to promote women’s mental health.
About Søren's project:
The primary aims are to determine:
1. If use of oral contraceptives (OCs) distorts serotonergic brain function in terms of serotonin 4 receptor (5-HT4R) binding in healthy young women measured with Positron Emission Tomography (PET).
2. If so, we will evaluate what mechanism may underlie this, i.e., is it direct effects of the synthetic steroids or indirect effects of the change in endogenous hormone production due to the synthetic steroids.
The secondary aims are to determine:
3. If OC-induced 5-HT4R changes map onto the emergence of (sub)clinical depressive symptoms including sexual dysfunctions and changes in behavioral-, emotional- and cognitive processes.
4. If OC use affects brain activation during reward-related behavior.
5. If OC use affects brain structure in terms of regional changes in gray matter volumes.
6. If OC use affects resting state network connectivity measured by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
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- New grant support to NRU research
- New PhD stipend from RHP
- New one-year research stipend from RH
- NRU X-mas symposium - Nov 29 in RH-Auditorium 2
- Substantial funding from FSS for three NRU research projects
- Prof. Vibe Frøkjær awarded prestigious Lundbeck Foundation Ascending Investigator Grant
- NRU part of new Center for Discoveries in Migraine
- Drummond McCulloch receives the Lundbeck Foundation Talent Prize 2024
- Prof. Russell Poldrack receives Rigshospitalet's International KFJ Award 2024
- Travel grant from 'Jordemoderforeningen'