Jonas Schupp comes with everything …

Jonas Schupp comes with everything that a university hospital could wish for in a young assistant physician: the qualified doctor, at 37, has already had numerous publications in high-ranking international journals, has spent four years at the renowned Yale School of Medicine at Yale University in the USA, carrying out research with the international expert Prof. Naftali Kaminski in the field of pulmonary fibrosis and, in the short time since his return to Germany and Hannover Medical School in the summer of 2021, he has already raised almost one million Euros of third-party funding.

It is therefore no surprise that it was a pleasure in the autumn to welcome Jonas Schupp as a Principal Investigator at the German Center for Lung Research (DZL). In the Department of Respiratory Medicine of Hannover Medical School (MHH) at the DZL site BREATH, he devotes his time to both patient care and his research. „At the moment I am busy setting up my own research laboratory. I am currently looking for motivated doctoral students“, says the outwardly always cheerful father of two small daughters. „I am extremely grateful that the Department of Respiratory Medicine is allowing me not only to complete my specialist training to become a pulmonologist but also to continue my research work. Cooperative and innovative research runs in my blood, and that is why the connection with the DZL is a stroke of luck for me.“

Already for many years, he has dedicated his basic research to the lung in general and interstitial pulmonary diseases in particular. Now, funding from the Else Kröner-Fresenius-Stiftung, the Fritz Thyssen Foundation and the German Research Foundation allows him to use the expertise in the cutting-edge technology of single cell RNA sequencing he gained whilst in the USA to solve questions in chronic pulmonary diseases, to better understand pathological changes at a cellular level and – it is hoped – to develop new molecular therapeutic approaches. „That is all very demanding! But I like to set myself major challenges“, Schupp adds with a smile.

At his home in Burgdorf near Hannover, he and his family have already settled in well, so that BREATH and the DZL can hope for a long and successful cooperation with him.

Text: BREATH/ AZ

Photo: J. Schupp

Dr. Jonas Schupp, Department of Respiratory Medicine at MHH and PI in the DZL at side BREATH