Malin Ernberg

Malin Ernberg

Professor/Senior Dentist
Telephone: +46852488236
Visiting address: Alfred Nobels Allé 8, 14104 Huddinge
Postal address: OF Odontologi, OF Oral rehabilitering, 171 77 Stockholm
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About me

  • Professor in Clinical Oral Physiology and Senior Consultant. 


    Malin Ernberg received her dental degree (DDS) at Karolinska Institutet 1979 and received her Specialist Diploma in Orofacial Pain/TMD in 1995. In 1999 she defended her PhD thesis and in 2004 she was appointed Associate Professor at KI. Between 2004 and 2006 she was guest researcher at the Department of Orofacial Pain at Aarhus University, Denmark during a total of 1 year. From 2009 to 2014 she had a 50% clinical research position financed by the Swedish Research Council and was 2012 appointed Professor in Clinical Oral Physiology at KI.

    During 2011 and 2012 she was the President of the Neuroscience Group of the International Association for Dental Research (IADR) and between 2013 to 2016 the President of the Swedish Pain Society, the national chapter of the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP). At the same time she was also a member of the European Pain Federation’s (EFIC) Council. Presently she is the President of the European Academy of Orofacial Pain and Dysfunction (EAOPD).

    She has co-authored more than 150 original papers, review papers and book chapters.

Research

  • My research group focuses on increasing our knowledge concerning the mechanisms behind chronic orofacial pain, emphasising jaw muscle pain and its sex differences. The research is translational, spanning from basic research conducted in patients and matched pain-free controls via human experimental studies where pain is experimentally induced to clinical intervention studies. We study potential algesic and inflammatory peripheral biomarkers, such as serotonin, glutamate, cytokines and neuropeptides.

    The Orofacial Pain Research Group is part of the larger Orofacial Neuroscience Group at the Department of Dental Medicine, which in turn collaborates with other leading research groups in Scandinavia, via the Scandinavian Center for Orofacial Neuroscience (SCON). The group has a close collaboration with the Specialist Clinic for Orofacial Pain at the Eastman Institute in Stockholm.

    The group also collaborates with several other reserach groups within KI and other Swedish and International universities.

    For information about specific research projects, please visit the Department's Research pages.

Teaching

  • I have always had a great interest in teaching and throughout the yeras been a member of various educational committees . At present I am affiliated to the Educational Committee at the Department of Dental Medicine. As Professor I have initiated radical changes of the teaching in my subject (Orofacial Pain and Jaw Function) for dental students, in which we have changed from having a more traditional teaching with lectures to Team-based learning. I was also responsible for the implementation of Observed Structural Clinical Examination (OSCE) within the undergraduate dental curriculum in 2009.

Articles

All other publications

Grants

  • Identification of the risk factors and salivary biomarkers associated with the transition from acute to chronic pain-related temporomandibular disorders as well as its persistence
    Canadian Institutes of Health Research
    1 April 2023 - 31 March 2028
    Jaw pain is one of the most common facial pain. Among individuals affected, approximately half to two-thirds will seek professional care. Nevertheless, a large proportion of these individuals still report persistent pain 5 years later, and some are even left with long-term disabilities. Unfortunately, there is no clear evidence on how to predict or prevent the persistence of PTMD. Thus, we will conduct this longitudinal study to investigate the factors associated with the persistence of jaw pain and to identify the biomarkers. Participants will be enrolled from dental clinics in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, and Edmonton. They will fill out questionnaires and provide saliva during the study to measure jaw pain, and the potential factors and biomarkers associated with the persistence of jaw pain. This study will cast new light on PTMD factors that could prevent the persistence of this pain.
  • National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases
    23 September 2022 - 31 August 2027
    The knowledge of the function, types, distributions, and plasticity of afferent neurites innervating temporomandibular joint (TMJ) tissues is needed to understand the underlying mechanisms controlling the development of temporomandibular joint disorder (TMJD) pain. The objective of this proposal is to address this critical gap in knowledge by comprehensively elucidating the functions, types, neuroanatomical distributions, and plasticity of trigeminal (TG) neurons innervating the muscles, tendons, and fascia of the masseter (MM) and lateral pterygoid (LPM) muscles, as well as the cartilage, joint capsule, and ligament around TMJ condyle in male, female and aged mice, primates, and humans with and without TMJD pain conditions. In support of this proposal, we have demonstrated that TMJ tissues are innervated by trigeminal (TG) neurons with unique and distinct properties, distributions and molecular signatures compared to previously described TG and dorsal root ganglia (DRG) neurons. Based on supporting data and the expertise of our multi-disciplinary team, we anticipate that this project will map the location and elucidate the phenotype and plasticity for TG neurons innervating TMJ tissues in male, female, and aged mice, primates and humans with and without TMJD pain conditions. We also expect candidate therapeutic target identification in TMJD patients’ TMJ tissues, which could ultimately lead to possible new treatments for TMJD. This study will be conducted in four interconnected yet independent aims. Aim 1 identifies the molecular signature, function and plasticity of TG neurons innervating TMJ tissues in male, female and aged mice with and without TMJD. Aim 2 maps afferent neurites innervating TMJ tissues in mice with and without TMJD. Aim 3 maps the location of neurites and define the phenotype and plasticity of TG neurons innervating TMJ tissues in non-human primates (NHP) with and without TMJD. Aim 4 examines TMJ tissue nerves and cell plasticity in TMJD patients. Substantial amount of data generated by this work will have a substantial positive impact by achieving most objectives of the RE-JOIN program, including (1) mapping the location of the afferent neurites in TMJ tissues
    (2) phenotyping and functionally characterizing TG neurons innervating a variety of TMJ tissues
    (3) identifying TMJD-induced plasticity of these TG neurons in male, female and aged mice, primates and humans
    (4) identifying novel candidate therapeutic targets in biopsies from TMJD patients
    and (5) increasing study translatability by validating data from TMJD mouse models in primate and human tissues. The proposed experiments will create large, integrated, annotated datasets and metadata and develop advanced approaches, which will be shared with the research community conducting similar studies.

Employments

  • Professor/Senior Dentist, Department of Dental Medicine, Karolinska Institutet, 2012-2025

Degrees and Education

  • Docent, Karolinska Institutet, 2004
  • Doctor Of Philosophy, Department of Dental Medicine, Karolinska Institutet, 1999
  • DDS, Karolinska Institutet, 1979

Distinction and awards

  • The Henry Beyron award for scientific achievments in Prosthetic dentistry and Orofacial pain in Sweden or abroad, 2012
  • The Swedish Dental Society award for the best doctoral thesis in odontology, 2001

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