Professor of neurosurgeon combined with employment as specialist physician at Karolinska University Hospital

- with focus on research

Do you want to contribute to top quality medical research?

The Department of Physiology and Pharmacology (FyFa) conducts education and research in physiology, pharmacology, anesthesiology and intensive care at a high international level.

The department has about 400 employees, almost 40 research groups, and 90 doctoral students. We offer a dynamic research and teaching environment in newly renovated premises in the newly built Biomedicum at Campus Solna, which is linked to corresponding clinical teaching and research environments at the Department of Perioperative Medicine and Intensive Care at Karolinska University Hospital. The research activities at the department include the fields of anesthesiology and intensive care, traumatology, cardiovascular and respiratory systems, neuropsychopharmacology, neuroinflammation, cellular signaling, pharmacogenetics, regenerative medicine, renal physiology, muscle physiology, and pain. The collaboration between preclinical and clinical researchers at Karolinska University Hospital provides excellent opportunities for translational research.

Description of the subject area

Neurosurgery is a combined academic and clinical subject area encompassing diagnostics, surgical treatment, and advanced perioperative and postoperative management of diseases and injuries of the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nerves. The field is closely integrated with neurointensive care, neuromonitoring, diagnostic imaging, biomarker research, rehabilitation, and translational precision medicine, with the aim of improving prognostics, treatment, and recovery in complex neurological conditions.

At FyFa, this subject area holds strategic importance by combining patient-centered research with human studies, preclinical experimental models, and data-driven analysis. This creates the conditions for research that integrates clinical cohorts, physiological monitoring, biobanking, AI-based analysis, multi-omics, and experimental cell and animal studies to understand mechanisms, biological heterogeneity, and treatment response in traumatic brain injury and other neurosurgical conditions. The subject area thus also has connections to FyFa's profile in physiology, pharmacology, and translational medicine.

In this context, HumanLab and ExtremeLab offer a platform for hospital-integrated research, multimodal data collection, and studies of brain function, resilience, and performance under load. Through the link between clinical neurosurgery, advanced human studies, and experimental models, this subject area can help strengthen KI's position in precision brain health, medical preparedness, and translational research.

Medical unit at Karolinska University Hospital is a highly specialized regional center for neurological surgery and is the country’s largest neurosurgical unit. The catchment area covers all of Stockholm County as well as Gotland County, encompassing approximately 2.2 million inhabitants. Patients from other counties are also treated following specialist care referrals, and patients from abroad are accepted by agreement.

Your mission

You will have solid expertise in both clinical and basic preclinical experimental research, and will lead and develop research in neurosurgery, including neurotrauma, brain resilience, and precision medicine. The position may include developing research programs that combine clinical cohorts and registry data, biomarkers, AI-based analysis, multi-omics, and experimental models, including animal studies, in collaboration with relevant research environments.

You will take on management responsibility for the strategic development of HumanLab and ExtremeLab. Experience in basic preclinical research and human studies is a prerequisite for developing HumanLab into a translational hub that bridges preclinical, clinical, and defence-related medicine. You will contribute to the development of these infrastructures into strong academic environments for research, education and international collaboration. You will act as a research group leader with responsibility for staff, delegated work environment responsibility, and supervision of students, doctoral students, and postdoctoral researchers. The role includes collaboration with other research groups within the department, Karolinska Institutet, nationally and internationally, as well as with Karolinska University Hospital and external societal stakeholders and industrial partners.

You will contribute to undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral-level education in areas relevant to FyFa's activities, including neurotrauma, brain resilience, and data-driven precision medicine. Other duties normally associated with a professorship include administration as well as internal and external positions of trust at the national and international level.

You will also work clinically at Karolinska University Hospital, Theme Heart, Vascular and Neuro, Medical Unit Neurosurgery.

The position is divided 70% at Karolinska Institutet and 30% at Karolinska University Hospital.

Eligibility requirements

To be eligible for an employment as Professor with focus on research the applicant must have demonstrated excellent scientific skills and very good pedagogical skills and, clinical skills.

For employment as Professor at Karolinska Institutet, the eligibility requirements are stated in the Instructions regarding the Appointment Procedure and these are applied in relation to the subject area of the established recruitment profile.

See the instructions regarding the Appointment Procedure for Teachers at Karolinska Institutet.

It is a requirement that you have completed 10 weeks of courses on teaching in higher education, as indicated in the recommendations of the Association of Swedish Higher Education Institution. If you lack such education at the time of employment, you must undergo such education during the first two years of employment.

The employment will be combined with an employment as a specialist physician, assistant chief physician or chief physician in neurosurgery at Medical Unit of Neurosurgery, Theme Heart, Vascular and Neuro, Karolinska University Hospital (Nya Karolinska Solna) and therefore you must have a Swedish MD with specialist competence in neurosurgery, as well as fulfill the National Board of Health and Welfare's requirements for practicing medicine in Sweden.

Since the position includes clinical work, you must, besides English, demonstrate proficiency in Swedish, Norwegian or Danish (C1 level according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages, CEFR.)

Assessment criteria

The Professorship has a focus on research. The assessment will weight qualifications as follows: scientific skills (3), pedagogical skills (2) leadership and collaboration skills (3), and clinical skills (2)

For employment as Professor at Karolinska Institutet, the assessment criteria are stated in the Instructions regarding the Appointment Procedure and these are applied in relation to established profile of employment:

See the instructions regarding the Appointment Procedure for Teachers at Karolinska Institutet.

It is furthermore meritorious that you have demonstrated

• Documented experience in building and leading strategic research infrastructures and interdisciplinary research environments
• Documented ability to combine patient-centered research with preclinical experimental models.

After an overall assessment of the expertise and merits of the applicants in relation to the subject area, Karolinska Institutet will determine which of them has the best potential to contribute to a positive development of the activities at KI.

What do we offer?

A creative and inspiring environment with wide-ranging expertise and interests. Karolinska Institutet is one of the world's leading medical universities. Here, we conduct innovative medical research and provide the largest range of biomedical education in Sweden. At KI, you get to meet researchers working with a wide range of specialisms and methods, giving you ample opportunity to exchange knowledge and experience with the various scientific fields within medicine and health. It is the crossover collaborations, which have pushed KI to where it is today, at the forefront of global research. Several of the people you meet in healthcare are educated at KI. A close relationship with the health care providers is important for creating groundbreaking top quality education and research. Karolinska Institutet is also a state university, which entitles you to several benefits through our collective agreement.

Location: Solna

 Your career continues here]
Department of Physiology and Pharmacology | Karolinska Institutet

Application

Your application must contain the following documents: a cover letter as well as a resumé and a qualifications portfolio including a description of your research plan, both presented in accordance with Karolinska Institutet’s template (http://ki.se/qualificationsportfolio). You may change or add to your application at any time up to and including the application deadline date. After the deadline, the process closes, and no amendment or addition can be made to your application.

The applications will be reviewed by external reviewers, most often both national and international. For that reason, we prefer that the documents are in English.

KI applies individual and differentiated salary setting in accordance with our collective agreements RALS and RALS-T.

The application is to be submitted through the Varbi recruitment system.

For the clinical employment at Karolinska University Hospital:

To obtain an employment as at least specialist physician (chief physician, assistant chief physician, specialist physician) at Karolinska University Hospital, assessment of the applicant’s clinical qualifications by the hospital’s Expert Committee is mandatory.

Hence, the documents listed below are required for determining the correct service level.

• Karolinska University Hospital’s form for Curriculum Vitae - download here
• Specialist certificate(s) in neurosurgery*
• PhD degree certificate**
• Certificate regarding docent/associate professor **
• List of 10 most important publications

*including specialist certificate(s) from other countries

**when applicable

Link to criteria for specialist physician at Karolinska University Hospital (in Swedish).

We look forward to receiving your application!

Want to make a difference? Join us and contribute to better health for all!

1. Sophie Erhardt, [email protected]
2. Anders Fytagoridis, [email protected]

1. Bodil Moberg , OFR/ST, [email protected]
2. Helin Norberg, SACO, [email protected]
3. Elizabeth Valenzuela, SEKO, [email protected]