Dr Claudia Langenberg, a Programme Leader with the MRC Epidemiology Unit, is one of five scientists to win this year’s Helmholtz International Fellow Award.
Dr Claudia Langenberg, a Programme Leader with the MRC Epidemiology Unit's Aetiology of Diabetes and Related Metabolic disorders programme, is one of five scientists to win this year’s Helmholtz International Fellow Award.
This prestigious award aims to intensify existing cooperation between Helmholtz Centres and international research institutes and to further strengthen the links between Helmholtz researchers and outstanding colleagues abroad. As well as receiving 20,000 Euros in prize money, Dr Langenberg has been invited to undertake a period of research at the Helmholtz Zentrum München.
Dr Gabi Kastenmüller, acting head of the Institute of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, and Professor Annette Peters, Director of the Institute of Epidemiology at the Helmholtz Zentrum München, nominated Claudia Langenberg for the award. Dr Kastenmüller said:
Claudia Langenberg is known for her research on genetic causes of insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes and related metabolic disorders. We are already collaborating on the most extensive study to date investigating genetic effects on metabolism and subsequent disease outcomes. We look forward to intensifying and deepening this mutually beneficial cooperation.”
The handover of the prize in Munich is scheduled for mid-November.
Dr Peters said:
Claudia Langenberg’s team integrates multi-omic data to better understand genetic factors underlying the risk of type 2 diabetes, which is also a research focus here at the Helmholtz Zentrum München. Much of her work uses large-scale datasets combining international population-based studies. We are now pleased to bring together the relevant expertise across national borders.”
Dr Langenberg has been involved in more than 250 scientific studies and has published in top-ranking journals. She played a leading role in setting up international consortia such as MAGIC (Meta-Analysis of Glucose and Insulin-related traits Consortium) and COMETS (Consortium of Metabolomics Studies). In 2017 she was Editor-in-Chief of the ‘Generation Genome’ report of the Chief Medical Officer of England, and this year the UK government established the National Genomics Board, tasked with implementing the report’s recommendations and restructuring genomic medicine within the National Health Service (NHS) in England.
Helmholtz International Fellow Award laureate Claudia Langenberg said:
I am very honored to receive this distinguished award, which I regard as international recognition of the team’s work and achievements. The award provides a stimulus to integrate our research even more closely with that of our scientific colleagues in Munich. I look forward to meeting the broader Helmholtz community in November and rediscover Munich, a city I have a very special connection to.”