One in five people in Europe suffers from chronic pain. It often dictates the daily lives of those affected, significantly reduces their quality of life and, in some cases, even renders them unable to work. Chronic pain is one of the greatest burdens on the healthcare system. It is not yet fully understood which molecular mechanisms cause pain to become chronic. Rohini Kuner is investigating which processes in the nervous system lead to pain being ‘learned’ and permanently stored in the body. Her research focuses on neural plasticity, i.e. the ability of nerve cells to adapt structurally and functionally. Kuner’s findings are leading to new therapeutic approaches for targeted and long-term effective treatments.
Rohini Kuner studied Pharmaceutical Biotechnology at the University of Bombay in India and obtained her PhD in 1994 at the University of Iowa in the USA. In 2005, she completed her habilitation at the Heidelberg Medical Faculty of Heidelberg University. She has held a W3 professorship in Pharmacology and Toxicology there since 2006. She has headed the Institute of Pharmacology since 2009. She is the spokesperson for the DFG Collaborative Research Centre “From Nociception to Chronic Pain: Structural and Functional Characteristics of Neural Pathways and Their Reorganisation”. Kuner has already received numerous awards for her research – including the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize from the German Research Foundation (DFG), the most prestigious research funding award in Germany.
The Jung Prize for Medicine has been awarded by the Hamburg-based Jung Foundation for Science and Research since 1976. It is endowed with 300,000 euros. The prize honours researchers whose projects have made a significant contribution to the advancement of human medicine. The focus is on research work of particular clinical relevance that holds promise for progress in the development of new, effective therapeutic approaches.