Molecular pathology of cystic fibrosis

 

 

Prof. Dr. med. | Dr. rer. nat.  Burkhard Tümmler

Research Group Leader

Hannover Medical School
Center Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine
Clinic for Pediatric Pneumology, Allergology and Neonatology
OE 6710, Carl-Neuberg-Str. 1, 30625 Hanover

Phone: +49 511 532-2920
Email: Burkhard Tümmler


Autosomal recessive cystic fibrosis (CF) is a systemic disease of the exocrine epithelium that manifests primarily in the respiratory and gastrointestinal tracts. The clinical research group focuses on the genetics and infectiology of CF, the microbiome in the CF airways, microevolution of Pseudomonas aeruginosa in the CF lung, and new options for treatment of the basic defect and chronic infections. 

The group was founded in 1983 at the Institute of Biophysical Chemistry of MHH and transferred to the clinical research group "Molecular pathology of cystic fibrosis" in 1992. During six years of funding by the German Research Foundation and the Max Planck Society, the clinical research group was initially based in the Center of Biochemistry of the MHH and the later Max Planck Institute for Experimental Endocrinology (now TwinCore) and moved into the new Pediatric Research Center immediately adjacent to the Children's Hospital in 1997, together with colleagues from the Department of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology. Since 1998, the clinical research group has been integrated into the Department of Pediatric Pulmonology. Over the past 40 years, the group has published over 300 primary publications on cystic fibrosis and pseudomonads. The group has become internationally known with patient-oriented studies of the basic CF defect in the European CF Twin and Sibling Study, studies of genome organization, microevolution, and population biology of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and most recently with analyses of the airway microbiome in chronic lung disease.

 

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