Maura Kere

I am a PhD student in Professor Erik Melén’s group, working with the population-based BAMSE birth cohort (see BAMSE Project). My research focuses on immunology and proteomics, with an emphasis on identifying systemic protein biomarkers and understanding the role of various lymphocytes in different asthma endotypes. My goal is to contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying asthma to ultimately support tailored treatments and improve patients' quality of life.

My interest in bioinformatics began early, at age 17, when I started developing my programming skills. My high school science project, supervised by Dr. Carsten Daub, won first prize in Finland’s national science competition, TuKoKe, and I represented Finland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists in 2014, where I received the Biology Special Prize. Since then, I have honed my expertise in R, expanding from basic data wrangling and regression models to exploring machine learning techniques.

In addition to my research, I am a medical doctor (MD), having graduated from Karolinska Institutet in January 2022. Before and after graduation, I gained experience as a junior doctor across various departments, including Internal Medicine, Cardiology, Surgery, and Emergency Medicine, in both Finland and Sweden. I currently work as a “forskar-AT” doctor, i.e. junior doctor with financed research time, at Södersjukhuset in Stockholm. I have a longstanding interest in anesthesiology: I have worked at the Enhanced Monitoring Ward in Lohja, Finland and I served as president of the Student Association for Surgery and Anesthesiology during my medical studies at KI. Additionally, I worked as an assistant nurse at Capio Sankt Göran Hospital’s Emergency Department during my medical studies.

Awards and Honors:

• Kerstin Hejdenberg’s scholarship, Swedish Asthma and Allergy Association 2024
• KI Travel Grant 2023
• Biology Special Prize, European Union Contest for Young Scientists 2014
• First prize, TutkiKokeileKehitä (Finnish national science competition for students) 2014

Selected PhD Courses:

• Bioinformatics Analysis and Visualisation of Medical Genomics Data
• Statistics with R – from Data to Publication Figure
• Antigen Presentation and T cell Activation