Kristine Freude

Kristine Freude, PhD, is a Professor at the Department of Veterinary and Animal Sciences at University of Copenhagen in Denmark. The research activities in her laboratory are focused on modeling and understanding neurodegenerative diseases using human induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC).

Her background in human genetics and stem cell biology has enabled her to generate several iPSC models for Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and Schizophrenia (SCZ) from patient material and via CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing. Her current research is focused on brain cell type specific phenotypes in AD and SCZ and she implements these iPSC models to gain mechanistic insights into the diseases.

Her research team has previously shown that FTD3 can be recapitulated in iPSC derived neurons, astrocytes and microglia, and they delivered new insights into neuronal disease phenotypes including metabolic defects. Their AD models display characteristic pathological hallmarks and have contributed to decipher cause and consequences in the disease pathology contributing to the identification of novel intervention points at the early disease stages.

The research team's SCZ dorsal forebrain organoids (DFOs) allowed them to investigate microRNA alteration related to SCZ and they are currently exploring the interplay of infectious diseases, microglia and DFOs in SCZ. The long-term aim of the research is to translate the in vitro results into identification of druggable targets and advanced diagnosis and patient group tailored treatments.