Páll Karlsson - Yale University, USA

Post Doc Páll Karlsson has received an exchange travel grant of 23.000 DKK for his research visit at a world-known lab led by Professor Stephen Waxmann at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, USA. The group is known for their groundbreaking research on sodium channels, particularly on skin biopsies from rodents.

Páll Karlssons main research interest lies in finding a biomarker for why some diabetic polyneuropathy patients develop neuropathic pain and others do not. Such a biomarker does currently not exist, but Páll Karlsson with his stay at Yale University he has gotten the opportunity to test a new hypothesis, namely that altered NaV 1.7 expression, likely detectable using immunocytochemical studies, plays a central role in these cases.

By combining the expertise of his research group with the expertise of Waxman’s group, they have a unique opportunity to further develop and optimize the sodium channel staining protocol in human tissue. These studies will subsequently allow them to investigate if diabetic polyneuropathy patients with and without pain have altered sodium channel expression in various skin regions from skin biopsies, which could explain why some patients with diabetic polyneuropathy develop chronic pain while others do not.