Chemistry of Life Theme: member of WG 1 – Structure, function and dynamics of macro-molecular complexes, Guest Researcher at LINXS January-December 2025, LINXS Fellow

Prof. Petri Kursula, Department of Biomedicine, University of Bergen, Norway (also affiliated with Faculty of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, University of Oulu, Finland)

Prof. Kursula is a structural biologist with broad interests in protein structure and function. His main research focus concerns proteins that are important for forming the multi-layered myelin proteolipid membrane in the nervous system. A complementary set of structural biology and biophysical methods are being used in the project, involving the use of both photons, neutrons, and electrons to study myelin structure. He got his PhD from the University of Oulu in 2000, and thereafter carried out three post-doctoral stays, at Biocenter Oulu, EMBL Hamburg, and the Karolinska Institute. In 2006, he was nominated Academy Research Fellow by the Academy of Finland, and since then, he has led his own research group at the University of Oulu, University of Hamburg/DESY synchrotron, and now at the University of Bergen. He is a full professor since 2014 and the leader of the BiSS core facility at the University of Bergen.