Taina Pihlajaniemi

BIO

Prof. Taina Pihlajaniemi is one of the leading scientists in the field of matrix biology. She has headed three Academy of Finland Centre of Excellences and she was a scientist co-founder of FibroGen Inc., a US-based biopharmaceutical company focusing on fibrosis and other medically critical targets.

She has served in numerous science policy tasks such as the Science and Innovation Council, the Research Council for Health at the Academy of Finland, and Biotechnology Working Groups, and in building the European research infrastructure roadmap. She was director of Biocenter Oulu, and together with the other Finnish bioinstitutes established the Biocenter Finland, a distributed national research infrastructure network of six universities, and was its founding director. She is Vice Rector for Research at the University of Oulu and guides its research profiling, and e.g., heads the National Steering Group of Open Science and Research.

She has graduated as a Medical Licentiate and a Doctor of Medicine and Surgery at the University of Oulu.