Stephan Mielke

Stephan Mielke

Professor/Senior Physician
Visiting address: Nobels väg 7, 17165 Solna
Postal address: H5 Laboratoriemedicin, H5 BCM Mielke, 141 52 Huddinge

About me

  • Stephan Mielke started as Professor of Hematology and Cell Therapy at Karolinska Institutet and Department Head and Scientific Director at the Cancer Center of Karolinska University Hospital in May 2017. He graduated in 1999 from Medical School and received his doctoral degree from Georg-August University in Göttingen. Trained in Internal Medicine, Hematology and Oncology at the University of Freiburg he was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, where he initaited clinical trials as a principle investigator and has since devoted his career to the development of advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMP) in cancer care. In 2007 he returned to Germany and became Director of the newly built Adult Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation Program and in 2014 Professor of Internal Medicine at the University of Würzburg. He focused on graft manipulation in haplo-identical stem cell transplantation and initiated world-wide multicenter trials with ATMPs as coordinating investigator.

    Mielke is one of Europe's pioneers in CAR T-cell therapy, being one of the first in Germany treating patients with CAR T-cells in 2016 as part of the JULIET trial (NEJM 2019) and was the first to perform CAR T cell therapy in 2019 at Karolinska as part of the TRANSFORM trial (Lancet 2022). He has performed Sweden's first standard of care CAR T cell treatment in 2019 and has recruited several international trials to Karolinska such as the TRANSCEND FOL study (Nature Med 2024). In close cooperation with the Phase I Unit the first solid tumor patients in the Nordics received gene-modified effector cells (TCR and CAR-T cells). Stephan Mielke has taken a leading role in the foundation of Karolinska Comprehensive Cancer Center (2020) as well as Karolinska ATMP Center, a cell and genetherapy center (2024). In 2019 he founded SWECARNET, Sweden’s CAR T cell network, a co-creational cooperation between academia, healthcare and industry to foster access to CAR T cell therapy for all patients in Sweden, serving today as an European role-model. 

    Actual Positions:
    Professor of Hematology and Cellular Therapy (LabMed, MedH)
    Head of Department and Senior Physician at the Center of Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation and Cellular Therapy (ME CAST, Tema Cancer).
    Director of the Cellular Therapy and Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation Program (JACIE).
    Member of Board of Directors of Karolinska Comprehensive Cancer Center (OECI) and Karolinska ATMP Center

Research

  • Stephan Mielke, Professor of Hematology and Cell Therapy at Karolinska Institutet and Head of Department at Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm, is a translational physician-scientist with Swedish board certification in Internal Medicine and Hematology and a special interest in cell- and gene therapy. His research group is closely related to both the reseach laboratory as well as the Department of Cellular Therapy and Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation and focuses on efficient translation of innovation from bench-to-bedside as well as from bedside-to-bench: "We work translational and co-creational with the patient in the center to provide fast access to innovation" explains Stephan Mielke. A central aim of this research is to increase the rates of cure for patients with leukemia and MDS, lymphoma, myeloma and solid tumors by harnessing the benefits of autologous and allogeneic immunity and maintain quality of life. More recently the treatment of inborn errors, immune defects and autoimmune diseases with both transplantation as well as cell and gene therapy have gained more and more attention. Stephan Mielke has built a wide-spread national and international network, has received several grants, has pulished more than 150 papers, has an H-Index of 50, and is regularly invited as a peer scientific reviewer for several international journals and funding organizations in the field of stem cell transplantation, cell and gene therapy as well as personalized medicine. He is regulary called in as international export and part of several European initiatives in the ATMP field such as JOIN4ATMP and the GoCART coalition.

Teaching

  • Stephan Mielke, Professor of Hematology and Cell Therapy and Department Head of Cellular Therapy and Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation (CAST) at Karolinska Institutet and University Hospital in Stockholm, is an expierenced academic and clinical teacher who has started his teaching carrier already as a student at the University of Göttingen in 1992 and has devoted since extensive efforts into teaching, training and mentoring of medical students and other health-care and biomedical professionals for more than three decades. He likes interdiciplinary, interprofessional and cross-curricular teaching approaches to provide different perspectives to students and generate better system understanding. His teaching style is interactive and motivating, inviting everybody to participate and to challenge where needed. As an internationally recognized expert for the fields of cell- and gene therapy, personalized medicine and comprehensive cancer therapy he has delivered several invited educational lectures at international meetings over the years. He has been supervising several master students and doctaral candidates (Dr. med./PhD)

Articles

All other publications

Grants

  • Swedish Research Council
    1 January 2024 - 31 December 2028
    Cancer is the second most common cause of death in Sweden. Recent breakthroughs in cancer therapy, e.g. check-point blockade and chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells, highlight the potency of the immune system in controlling and eradicating cancer, but also its limitations in combating many forms of solid tumors. Major efforts are needed to better target cancer and enhance the homing, persistence and function of effector immune cells, requiring close collaboration between basic and clinical scientists. Our goal is to create a vibrant multidisciplinary center that bridges expert knowledge in the biology of cytotoxic lymphocytes – immune cells that kill cancer cells – with that of good manufacturing practice compliant production and adoptive cell therapy in the clinic. Thereby, we will foster innovative new adoptive cell therapies focused on tumor-directed lymphocytes. A major emphasis will be on recruiting and supporting outstanding young principal investigators as well as postdoctoral researchers dedicated to engineering of lymphocytes for cellular therapy of cancer. We will also establish a program for internationally leading visiting scholars to invigorate discussions and innovation within our unique research constellation. Scholars will also contribute to teaching of workshops and graduate courses. Altogether, our efforts aim to expand competence and create an international leading platform within a rapidly developing field of living drugs against cancer.
  • Swedish Cancer Society
    1 January 2023
    Ovarian cancer is a gynecological disease with a high mortality rate. The symptoms appear stealthily and the cancer can therefore be difficult to detect in the early phase. A large percentage of women who are affected respond well to first-line treatment (surgery and chemotherapy), but unfortunately most usually relapse within a few years and then no curative options are available. It is therefore important that research on ovarian cancer progresses so that new treatments can be developed. Immunotherapy has shown promising results against other forms of cancer, and in Prof. Mielke's group we are therefore researching the development of such an immunotherapy against ovarian cancer. Immunotherapy means a treatment that utilizes the strength of the immune system in your own body. You can say that immunotherapy helps your immune system to better 'attack' the tumor. Immunotherapy has shown successful effects against other forms of cancer in recent decades, but unfortunately immunotherapy against ovarian cancer has not yet shown good enough results, which requires further research and development for such a treatment to be approved. What suggests that immunotherapy actually has potential against ovarian cancer is that studies have found that women with ovarian cancer live longer if they have many immune cells near the tumor. The goal of the research is to develop an immunotherapy against ovarian cancer that works better than today's standard treatment. The hope is to eventually increase the survival of all patients with ovarian cancer.
  • VINNOVA
    31 December 2022 - 1 June 2026
    Purpose and goal: SWECARNET is an open network of key representatives in the Swedish CAR T field from academia, healthcare, and industry working towards knowledge exchange and development of standardized processes for CAR T delivery and follow-up. SWECARNET’s central goal is to implement gene-modified immune effector cell therapy, such as CAR T, so that patients in need, and likely to benefit, get access to new treatments through clinical trials or as standard of care treatment independent of where they are living in the country. Expected results and effects: The collaboration in this network will facilitate the translation of advanced therapies into clinical use and create an arena for innovation within academia and healthcare to be generated in, and with help from industry to reach patients. SWECARNET is expected to be at the forefront of the field both nationally and internationally and serve as a workhorse for solving challenges around the implementation of advanced therapies. SWECARNET will act as a catalyst to increase the number of clinical trials for CAR T and other advanced therapy medicinal products in Sweden. Approach and implementation: All members in SWECARNET will be involved and work together on 8 different work packages with an assigned project leader. SWECARNET arranges quarterly meetings where we work together, follow up and report the progress made in the various work packages. SWECARNET is led by Professor Stephan Mielke, Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska Universitetssjukhuset together with Professor Gunilla Enblad, Uppsala Universitet and Akademiska Sjukhuset.
  • Swedish Research Council
    1 January 2019 - 31 December 2021

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