Soeren Lienkamp received the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize for his work in the area of Medicine.
The nephrologist Soeren Lienkamp deals with the small tubes in the kidney, the tubules, in which urine is produced. If the tubules are disturbed by a cystic disease, molecular processes similar to those in embryonic development may take place. Lienkamp uses the clawed frog tadpole as a model organism. Using confocal microscopy, he was able to analyze the extent to which directed cell migration is responsible for tubule formation. He demonstrated the complex migration mechanism by which cells in a rosette-shaped network narrow and lengthen the tube. From 2010 onwards, Lienkamp was part of the Clinical Research Unit on Polycystic Kidney Diseases and established a research group that has been investigating how kidney cells specify and re-program since 2014 as part of the DFG’s Emmy Noether Program.
