HUNTINGTON, W.Va. - One of the world's leading kidney authorities and researchers will be speaking next week at Marshall University.

Dr. Anita Aperia, professor of pediatrics at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm and a former member of the Nobel Assembly, is widely recognized for her groundbreaking research contributions to medicine's understanding of how the kidneys function in health and disease.

Her talk titled "The Physiological Function of Na+/K+-ATPase" will begin at 1 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 12, in Room 101 of the Robert C. Byrd Biotechnology Science Center on Marshall University's Huntington campus.

The free event is part of a series of public lectures hosted by the Marshall Institute for Interdisciplinary Research.

Research at MIIR is focused on Na+/K+-ATPase a protein often referred to as the "sodium potassium pump" because it directs many cellular processes in the heart, kidney and other tissues. By studying how this cellular signaling occurs, the institute's researchers are working to develop new treatments for cancer, heart and kidney disease.

A native of Sweden, Aperia graduated from the Karolinska Institutet medical school and received her Ph.D. training at Yale University. She has been at the Karolinska Institutet since 1976, and as chairman of the department of pediatrics from 1987-99, was the founder and project leader for Astrid Lindgren Children's Hospital, the largest children's hospital in Northern Europe.

In 1987, she was appointed to the Nobel Assembly for Physiology or Medicine in Stockholm, where she served as a member until 2003. From 1991-96, she was a member of the Nobel Committee and in 2001 she was the first woman to chair the Nobel Assembly.

She has served as a council member of the International Society of Nephrology, the International Pediatric Society of Nephrology and the European Society of Nephrology.

Aperia was the 2001 recipient of the Jean Hamburger Award from the International Society of Nephrology the first pediatrician to receive the prestigious international award. In 2011, she received the Homer W. Smith Award from the American Society of Nephrology and in 2013 was the presenter of the Robert Berliner lecture at Yale. She also has received the Torsten and Ragnar Soderberg Prize in Medicine from the Swedish Society of Medicine, and another Swedish honor, His Majesty the King's Medal.

A dedicated teacher, Aperia has trained numerous undergraduate students and pediatric residents, and has supervised nearly 50 Ph.D. students and 30 postdoctoral fellows. She also has published approximately 300 original papers, 40 review articles and 10 textbook chapters.

In addition to the public lecture, Aperia will present Grand Rounds in the Department of Pediatrics at Marshall University Medical Center at 8 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 13. Her topic will be "How being a pediatric nephrologist has influenced my scientific work and vice versa."

For more information about the programs, contact Hollie Bailey at bailey134@marshall.edu or 304-696-3549.

MIIR is Marshall's key vehicle to advancing regional economic development through entrepreneurship and commercialization of scientific discoveries. Scientists at the institute are developing an intensive program of biotechnology research dedicated to producing patentable scientific breakthroughs and creating new businesses based on those discoveries.

For more information, visit www.marshall.edu/miir

Date Posted: Monday, February 9, 2015