This week, we received great news when Janne and Arun were awarded UEF postdoctoral positions for the next 2 years. The competition was tough; there were 36 applications, 11 were interviewed, and only 6 applicants got the position in our Faculty of Health Sciences. So congratulations on both! As I'm being lazy now, I will post the text from LinkeIn:
Janne Tampio studies
prodrugs that utilize transporters to enhance drug targeting, working
with Assoc. Prof. Kristiina Huttunen. In his postdoctoral research, he
focuses on organic anion transporting polypeptides (OATPs) for
cell-type-specific brain drug delivery. His main scientific interests
include in vitro models and mass spectrometry. Over the coming years,
his main aim is to translate results from mouse models to the human
context, in collaboration with Prof. Annakaisa Haapasalo. Furthermore,
bioanalytical methods applied with Assoc. Prof. Marko Lehtonen and
international partners will reveal transporter expression profiles and
highlight the benefits of targeted drug delivery.
Arun
Tonduru is developing automated workflows that integrate molecular
dynamics (MD) into virtual screening to boost hit rates in drug
discovery. This work is carried out in collaboration with Prof. Antti
Poso and Orion Pharma. Alongside this, he continues his research on OATP
transporters, focusing particularly on OATP1B1 and OATP2B1. For
OATP1B1, his goals include investigating drug–drug interactions that
arise from transporter inhibition and identifying structural
determinants of inhibition by peptides — in collaboration with Assoc.
Prof. Kristiina Huttunen and Dr. Carolina Säll (Novo Nordisk). Another
major aim is to predict how OATP1B1 mutations affect the transport of
substrates and inhibitors, in collaboration with Prof. Tetsuya Terasaki
and Keio University, Japan.
