Pääbo Svante
Academic titles:
- professor Doctor of Science
Membership in the Academy:
- corresponding member – Department of Natural Sciences (5/10/2012 – …)
Curriculum Vitae
Svante Päabo, a Swedish anthropologist and geneticist, was born in Stockholm in 1955. He completed his studies in humanities and the history of this medicine at the University of Uppsala, where he achieved a Doctor of Science degree in 1986. He trained at the Institute for Molecular Biology II in Zurich, at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund in London and at the Department of Biochemistry, University of California in Berkeley. He achieved a degree of assistant professor in medical genetics at the University of Uppsala and became a professor in 1990 in the field of general biology at the University of Munich. Since 1997, he has been director of the Department of Evolutionary Genetics of Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, where he has been a professor of genetics and evolutionary biology since 1999; since 2003, he has been a professor of comparative genomics at the University of Uppsala. He and his associates have published more than 200 original scientific papers, 20 chapters in books and two patents, which have been cited more than 24,000 times (h-index 85), until today.
Svante Pääbo has developed techniques and approaches that allow DNA sequences from archaeological and paleontological remains to be determined. This has allowed ancient DNA from extinct organisms, humans, animals, and pathogens to be studied. He determined a high-quality Neandertal genome sequence, allowing for the reconstruction of the recent evolutionary history of our species and the realization that Neandertals contributed DNA to present-day humans who live outside Africa. By studying DNA sequences from a small Siberian bone, he discovered Denisovans, a previously unknown hominin group distantly related to Neandertals. He also works on the comparative and functional genomics of humans and apes, particularly the evolution of genetic features such as the FOXP2 ‘speech and language’ gene that may underlie aspects of traits specific to humans.
Svante Pääbo has received several honorary doctorates and scientific prizes and is a member of numerous academies. For his contribution to science, he received numerous medals: Max Delbrück Medal, Leibniz Science Prize, Rudbeck Prize, Ernst Schering Prize, Louis Jeantet Prize for Medicine, Virchow Medal, Gorjanović-Kramberger Medal, Academy of Achievement Honoree, Pour le Mérite, Kistler Prize, Grosses Bundesverdienstkreuz mit Stern, Darwin-Plakette, Anatomische Les, Theodor Bücher Medal, Newcomb-Cleveland Prize, Biochemical Analysis Prize, Carus Medal and Prize Dr.
He is also a member of several academies: Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Royal Swedisch Academy of Sciences, Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina), Saxonian Academy of Sciences, Academia Europea, American National Academy of Sciences (USA), Academie Internationale de Philosophie des Sciences, American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
He is a member of the editorial boards of a number of international scientific journals: Journal of Human Evolution, Genome Research, Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, Biological Chemistry, BioTechniques, Human Heredity, Ancient Biomolecules, etc.
For his scientific work, he received honorary doctorates from the University of Zurich, the University of Helsinki, and the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.
He was elected as a corresponding member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in 2012.