Center of Excellence in Disease Genetics

University of Helsinki, National Public Health Institute and Folkhälsan

Director: Academy Professor Leena Peltonen-Palotie
Tel. +358 9 4744 8393
Fax +358 9 4744 8480
leena.palotie(at)ktl.fi

Centre of Excellence pages

The members of the Unit take advantage of the specific features of the Finnish population:  isolation, the small original population and the excellent health care system.

When the genome project is completed, research in disease genetics faces new methodological and strategic challenges: how to understand the cellular and tissue consequences of disease mutation, how to cure them with gene therapy, and how do genomes and environment or lifestyle predispose to common public health problems in Finland?

In particular, the research carried out at the Centre aims at understanding the function of the disease genomes damaging the central nervous system and at identifying the genetic component in common Finnish diseases such as multiple sclerosis, colon cancer and asthma.

Directors of the research teams:
Academy Professor Lauri Aaltonen (team of 11)
Docent Anu Jalanko (team of 13)
Professor Juha Kere (team of 17)
Docent Anna-Elina Lehesjoki (team of 15)
Professor Leena Peltonen-Palotie (team of 30).