Michael Karin

Dr. Michael Karin received his BSc in Biology in 1975 at Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel and his PhD in Molecular Biology in 1979, at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Karin is currently a Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology and Pathology at the School of Medicine, University of California, San Diego, where has been on the faculty since 1987. He was a cofounder of Signal Pharmaceutical (currently Celgene) and had served as a member of its Scientific Advisory Board. Dr. Karin also served as a member of the National Advisory Council for Environmental Health Sciences and has been an American Cancer Society Research Professor since 1999.

Dr. Karin was elected as a member of the US National Academy of Sciences in 2005 and as an associate member of the European Molecular Biology Association in 2007. He is a leading world authority on signal transduction pathways that regulate gene expression in response to extracellular stimuli, infection, inflammation and stress. Key achievements include the definition of cis-elements that mediate gene induction by hormones, cytokines and stress, identification and characterization of the transcription factors that recognize these elements (members of the AP-1/ATF family) and the protein kinase cascades that regulate their activities, including the Jun kinases (JNK) and IkB kinases (IKK). Much of Dr. Karin’s current activity is focused on understanding the link between inflammation, cancer and metabolic disease as well as on understanding the signaling mechanisms used by receptors involved in inflammation and innate immunity. In addition to establishing molecular links between obesity, inflammation and cancer, this work has revealed new targets for cancer prevention and therapy. Dr. Karin has published over 300 scientific articles and is an inventor on over 30 different patents or pending patent applications. In addition to numerous honors, Dr Karin was ranked first worldwide by the Institute of Scientific Information (ISI) in a listing of most-cited molecular biology and genetic research papers published in prestigious journals.