Professor Dr Tomas Hökfelt
Professor Emeritus of Histology Neurology at the Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska Institutet Stockholm, Sweden

Venue: Department of Psychiatry / Lecture Hall. Medical University of Innsbruck
Date: October 13, 2017.

Short biography

Tomas Hökfelt was born in Stockholm, Sweden in 1940. He enrolled in the Karolinska Institutet in 1960 and got his BA in Medicine in 1960. He then studied at the Karolinska Institutet under professor Nils-Åke Hillarp, studying monoamine neurons, getting his PhD in 1968 and his MD in 1971. He became an assistant professor in 1968, and from 1979 until 2006, Hökfelt worked as a professor at the Karolinska Institute. He was also a faculty member of the Department of Biotechnology at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

Research and publications
Tomas Hökfelt’s early research was on neurotransmitters and neuropeptides in the brain. In 1977 he discovered that non-neurotransmitter peptide molecules like somatostatin, can exist with neurotransmitters in same peripheral and central neurons. Hökfelt together with Serguei Fetissov has also conducted research into anorexia nervosa, indicating that it may be a disease, caused by a particular group of antibodies. Together with Anders Björklund, he has edited 21 volumes of the Handbook of Chemical Neuroanatomy between 1983 and 2005