Margaret Liu
Affiliated to Research
E-mail: margaret.liu@ki.se
Visiting address: CMM, L8:03, Karolinska universitetssjukhuset, 17176 Stockholm
Postal address: K2 Medicin, Solna, K2 Reuma Wahren-Herlenius M, 171 77 Stockholm
About me
- Margaret A. Liu is known in the fields of vaccines, gene delivery, and cancer immunotherapy. She earned an M.D. from Harvard Medical School, completed Internal Medicine Internship and Residency followed by an Endocrinology Fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard, and was on the faculty at Harvard and a Visiting Scientist at MIT. Previously she had graduated summa cum laude majoring in chemistry from Colorado College (which she attended on a Boettcher Foundation full scholarship), and passed the Epreuve de piano pour le Diplôme d’Enseignement à l’Unanimité du Jury (judges’ unanimous decision) at L’Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris.
- She pioneered two technologies for vaccines and cancer (DNA vaccines and bispecific antibodies) and has received a number of international awards with two honorary doctorates, including an M.D.hc, from the KI, where she had been previously invited to lecture by the Nobel committee in the Karolinska Research Lecture series, and a D.Sc.hc from Colorado College (which inaugurated the Margaret A. Liu, Health Justice Award in 2023). She was named one of "The 50 Most Important Women Scientists" by Discover Magazine and is known as "The Mother of DNA vaccines" a technology that also laid foundations for mRNA vaccines. She was the scientific lead for the group writing the WHO guidelines for mRNA vaccines.
- In addition to being Hedersdoktor with Scientific Affiliation in the KI Department of Medicine, she previously was Visiting Professor, KI, then Foreign Adjunct Professor, MTC, KI) and is Adjunct Full Professor at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Dr. Liu is CEO of PAX Therapeutics, and Principal of ProTherImmune, LLC, where she advises companies, investment firms, and scientific governmental and non-governmental organizations. She is a member of the board and President Emerita of the International Society for Vaccines, and on the Scientific Advisory Boards of the Oxford Jenner Institute (which developed the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine) and various companies. She is a Director of Ipsen Pharma and MacroGenics, and is on the Supervisory Board of Nanobiotix. Previous executive and board positions have included Merck, Chiron, Sangamo, Transgène, and Adjuvance.
- She was formerly Senior Advisor in Vaccinology at the Bill &
- Melinda Gates Foundation
- Executive Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees (and previously Chair of the Scientific Advisory Group during the time that IVI played a key role in devleoping an oral cholera vaccine) of the International Vaccine Institute established by the United Nations (headquartered in Korea- and now with an office in Stockholm)
- Treasurer and member of the Board of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music
- and a member of the US NIH NIAID Advisory Council during Dr. Tony Fauci's tenure.
Research
Gene-based vaccines and therapies, immune responses for preventive and therapeutic vaccines and cancer therapy, broadly protective immune responses for HIV and influenza, gene therapy for optimized tendon and ligament healing
Teaching
Various courses at KI, UCSF, the International Vaccine Institute, Institute Pasteur, honorary lectures, different European vaccine consortia. I have also been an opponent for PhD thesis presentations at the KI.