Biotechnology

Biography

Radovan Komel is Professor of Biochemistry and molecular biology at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Ljubljana. He pioneered gene technology and initiated medical molecular biology/genetics in Slovenia. He was the founder and head of the Medical Centre for Molecular Biology and coordinated the national research program Functional Genomics and Biotechnology for Health, in 2004 quoted by Slovenian Research Agency among the top programs in the field of life sciences. He published more than 165 publications in international journals including N. Engl. J. Med., Neuron, Am. J. Hum. Genet..., and has activelly supervised 74 PhD and MSc theses. He has extensive experience of the coordination and management of research projects (e.g. ESRD CoE Biotechnoloy with Pharmacy, joining research efforts of 19 partners from academic and health care institutions, S&M entreprises and pharmaceutical industry; 2004-2009), and has organised several international conferences, the last »MolMed 2012« sponsored by EMBO and including a Nobel laureate opening lecture. He has served as member and Chair Person of the ICGEB Council of Scientific Advisers (2007 – 2013). He is President of Slovenian Society for Natural Sciences, and is editor of Proteus, a popular science journal, as well as member of editorial board of Acta Chim. Slov. He is Fellow of several academic societies and has served as reviewer of research projects at Slovenian Research Agency (1992-1996; 2000-2005), European Science Fundation (2001 – 2005), International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (2000-2003), European Research Council (2011), Cancer Research UK (2016) and ERA CoBiotech (2017), and also as reviewer of research papers submitted to a number of international journals. For special achievements in biochemistry and molecular biology he received the Slovenian National Science Award in 1994, First Lapanje Award from Slovenia Biochemical Society in 2008, and The Grand Miroslav Zei Award for Life Work in the Field of the Activities of the National Institute of Biology in 2015. In 2004 he was decorated by French Government ‘Knight in the Order of Academic Palms’.

Research Interest

He is currently working as a leading partner of the international EC Interreg project TRANS-GLIOMA, and also coordinates the drafting of Slovenian legislation concerning biomedicine and human genome.