Organizer

Prof. Eicke Latz is an immunologist and physician-scientist whose research focuses on the molecular mechanisms that regulate innate immunity and inflammation. He studied medicine at the Georg-August University Göttingen and the Freie Universität Berlin and subsequently trained and worked in intensive care medicine at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Ber-lin. In 2001, he moved to the United States, first as a postdoctoral fellow at Boston University and subsequently at UMass Medical School, where he established his independent research program and became Professor of Medicine.

In 2009, Latz returned to Germany to establish and direct the Institute of Innate Immunity at the University of Bonn. Since 2023, he has served as Scientific Director of the German Rheumatism Research Centre Berlin (DRFZ), a Leibniz Institute, and as Professor of Experimental Rheumatology at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin. Latz's research seeks to understand how the innate immune system maintains tissue homeostasis, how inflammatory responses are initiated and resolved, and how dysregulation of these processes contributes to human disease. His work has made major contributions to the understanding of inflammasomes, innate immune sensing, immunometabolism and inflammatory reprogramming, with implications for rheumatic and metabolic diseases, atherosclerosis, and neurodegenerative disorders including Alzheimer's disease. A major goal of his research is to translate mechanistic insights into new strategies for treating and preventing inflammatory disease.

Alongside his academic work, Latz has been active in translating basic discoveries into therapeutic development. He has co-founded several biotechnology companies, including IFM Therapeutics, Dioscure Therapeutics, Beren Therapeutics, Odyssey Therapeutics, and Me-taImmune Therapeutics. Several programs originating from these activities have been acquired or developed further by major pharmaceutical companies.

Latz has authored more than 300 scientific publications, with more than 125,000 citations and an h-index of 138 according to Google Scholar. He has been recognized as a Highly Cited Researcher in Immunology every year since 2014. He was elected to the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina in 2016 and to the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities in 2024. Among his honors is the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize, Germany's most prestigious research award.

« Go Back