Hartmut Wekerle

Hartmut Wekerle (born in 1944) is a German medical scientist and neurobiologist. He is director at the Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology and head of the department Neuroimmunology.

Hartmut Wekerle studied medicine at the University of Freiburg where he also gained his PhD. As a post-doctoral researcher, he worked at the Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel) and the Max Planck Institute for Immunobiology in Freiburg. Afterwards, he led the Research Group for Multiple Sclerosis at the Institute of Clinical Neurobiology at the University Hospital of the University of Würzburg. In 1988, he was appointed director at the Max Planck Institute for Neurobiology.

Scientific focus

Hartmut Wekerle’s scientific research is focused on the underlying reasons and mechanisms of diseases which arise due to a coflict between the immune system and the nervous system, his main focus being on multiple sclerosis.

Hartmut Wekerle’s work led to a number of scientific findings. Among these were the discoveries of
# potentially autoaggressive antibodies in a healthy immune system. "(Schlüsener & Wekerle, J. Immunol. 1985)"
# the specialized organization of the immune response in the nervous system. "(Fontana et al., Nature 1984)"
# the role of B cells in autoimmune reactions of the nervous system. "(Krishnamoorthy et al., J. Clin. Invest. 2006)"

External links

* [http://www.neuro.mpg.de/english/rd/ni/index.html Homepage of the department Neuroimmunology]