This year’s Avrion Mitchison Prize of the Schering Stiftung for the best research work in the field of chronic inflammation is awarded to Rafael Deite Lantas. He will present his research on the occasion of the award ceremony on December 5, 2017.

A sustained increase of soluble inflammatory molecules in the bloodstream is the main reason for the development of chronic autoimmune diseases, such as psoriasis or arthritis. Enzyme activity enhances the shedding of molecules into the bloodstream. In his work, Rafael Dante Leitas has shown that the protein Fhl2 blocks the involved enzyme Adam17 and thus inhibits the shedding of TNFalpha into the blood. The protein Fhl2 is thus a potential target molecule for the treatment of chronic autoimmune diseases, such as psoriasis.

Rafael Leite Dantas (born 1985) studied physiotherapy from 2006 to 2011 at the State University of Piauí (UESPI), Brazil. After completing his Master’s degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences in 2014 at the Federal University of Piauí (UFPI), Brazil, he moved to Münster, where he is working at the Institute of Virology of the Center for Molecular Biology of Inflammation (ZMBE). As part of his PhD studies he focuses on “TNFalpha-mediated chronic inflammations” in the group of Prof. Dr. med. Viktor Wixler.