The CRTD Welcomes Prof. Kai Markus Schneider as a New Research Group Leader

Kai Markus Schneider receives professorship at the Faculty of Medicine Carl Gustav Carus at TUD Dresden University of Technology

As of October 1, 2024, Kai Markus Schneider became a Professor of Molecular Gastroenterology and Hepatology at TUD Dresden University of Technology. The physician studies the complex crosstalk between organs such as the liver, gut, brain, and the immune system. He identifies key areas for the development of new therapies against chronic inflammatory gastrointestinal and liver diseases. He will conduct his research at the Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD) and the Else Kröner Fresenius Center (EKFZ) for Digital Health at TU Dresden.

Professor Kai Markus Schneider is moving from RWTH Aachen University to Dresden. The specialist in internal medicine researches the complex interactions and communication pathways between organs. He contributed to further decoding the so-called gut-brain axis, discovering a molecular circuit responsible for amplifying intestinal inflammation under psychological stress. His findings have been published in prestigious journals like Cell and Nature Communications. These insights are applied in modern treatment approaches aimed at reducing brain stress signals that affect the gut in chronic inflammatory bowel diseases. Additionally, he investigates the crosstalk between organs such as the gut, liver, and brain with the immune system and its influence on diseases like liver cirrhosis and cancer.

His research group “Digital Systems Medicine and Organ Crosstalk” will be based at the CRTD and the EKFZ for Digital Health. His team covers a wide range of expertise from molecular biology and immunology to bioinformatics, data science and clinical medicine. This promotes lively scientific exchange and allows to address research questions from different perspectives and to develop innovative solutions. Kai Markus Schneider has been combining research and clinical practice since his medical studies. He completed both a medical and a scientific doctorate. In Dresden, in addition to his research, he will also take care of patients at the Medical Clinic and Polyclinic I of University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus.

“Dresden's university medicine offers excellent conditions for combining research, teaching and clinical work. I want to further strengthen clinical hepatology at TU Dresden and, through my professorship, fulfill a central bridging function between patient-oriented care and excellent research. This unique position allows me to integrate the latest scientific findings into clinical practice and, conversely, to derive important research questions from daily work with patients. Ultimately, we want to improve the quality of life of people with liver disease by closing the gap between the lab and the clinic, efficiently translating research findings into therapies,” says Prof. Kai Markus Schneider.

“We are delighted to have gained Kai Markus Schneider, an experienced doctor and brilliant researcher. With his patient-oriented approach and innovative research, he is an excellent addition to Dresden's university medicine. His research makes an important contribution to better understanding chronic inflammatory diseases of the stomach, intestines, and the liver and to developing new therapeutic approaches,” says Prof. Jochen Hampe, Scientific Speaker of the EKFZ for Digital Health and Director of the Medical Clinic and Polyclinic I at the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden.

“Kai Markus Schneider's professorship will expand the scientific profile in the field of clinical gastroenterology and bridge the gap between research and clinical application in order to integrate innovative therapies into practice. His experimental research is carried out in close collaboration with the CRTD at TU Dresden, where the relevant interdisciplinary approaches are developed. This creates an important basis for the establishment of new therapies that will benefit patients in the future”, explains Prof. Esther Troost, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine Carl Gustav Carus at TU Dresden.

Additional information

About the person
Kai Markus Schneider studied medicine at RWTH Aachen University with international stays at MD Anderson Cancer Center (Houston/USA) and Brigham and Women's Hospital at Harvard Medical School (Boston/USA). Concurrently, he completed a scientific degree as part of Aachen’s MD-PhD program. In 2017, he earned his medical doctorate, and in 2019, his scientific doctorate at RWTH Aachen University. From 2020 to 2022, he received a research fellowship from the German Research Foundation (DFG) and was a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia/USA. Since 2022, he has led his own research group “Experimental Gastroenterology and Organ Crosstalk” at the University Hospital RWTH Aachen. He is a specialist in internal medicine and has been a W1 professor and attending physician at RWTH Aachen since 2023. His excellent research has been recognized with several awards. Most recently, he received the Theodor Frerichs Prize from the German Society of Internal Medicine in 2024 and was honored by the DFG with the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize, endowed with 200,000 euros.

Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus at TUD Dresden University of Technology
Dresden University Medicine, consisting of the Medical Faculty Carl Gustav Carus and the University Hospital of the same name, specializes in research in the fields of oncology, metabolism, neurological and psychiatric diseases. Within these key areas, the topics of degeneration and regeneration, imaging and technology development, immunology and inflammation as well as prevention and care research are of particular interest. Internationality is a prerequisite for cutting-edge research – the University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden lives this concept with employees from 93 nations and numerous collaborations with researchers and teams from all over the world.

https://tu-dresden.de/med/mf
https://www.uniklinikum-dresden.de/

Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD)
The Center for Regenerative Therapies Dresden (CRTD) of TUD Dresden University of Technology is an academic home for scientists from more than 30 nations. Their mission is to discover the principles of cell and tissue regeneration and leverage this for the recognition, treatment, and reversal of diseases. The CRTD links the bench to the clinic, scientists to clinicians to pool expertise in stem cells, developmental biology, gene-editing, and regeneration towards innovative therapies for neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, hematological diseases such as leukemia, metabolic diseases such as diabetes, bone and retina diseases. The CRTD was founded in 2006 as a research center of the German Research Foundation (DFG) and funded until 2018 as a DFG Research Center, as well as a Cluster of Excellence. Since 2019, the CRTD is funded by the TU Dresden and the Free State of Saxony.
The CRTD is one of three institutes of the central scientific facility Center for Molecular and Cellular Bioengineering (CMCB) of the TU Dresden.

http://www.tud.de/crtd
http://www.tud/de/cmcb

Else Kröner Fresenius Center (EKFZ) for Digital Health
The EKFZ for Digital Health at TU Dresden and University Hospital Carl Gustav Carus Dresden was established in September 2019. It receives funding of around 40 million euros from the Else Kröner Fresenius Foundation for a period of ten years. The center focuses its research activities on innovative, medical and digital technologies at the direct interface with patients. The aim here is to fully exploit the potential of digitalization in medicine to significantly and sustainably improve healthcare, medical research and clinical practice.
 digitalhealth.tu-dresden.de

Contact
EKFZ for Digital Health
Anja Stübner and Dr. Viktoria Bosak
Public Relations
Tel.: +49 351 – 458 11379

 digitalhealth.tu-dresden.de