Bjorn Dahlback MD, PhD

Björn Dahlbäck was born in Sweden. He attended Lund University where he earned his MD. He completed an internship and residency at University Hospital in Malmö, Sweden. Johan Stenflo, a pioneer in blood coagulation research, served as his PhD mentor. This experience was crucial for his career as an investigator of thrombotic and hemorrhagic diseases. He did postdoctoral research at Scripps in LaJolla with Hans Müller-Eberhard, a leading scientist in complement research, and later was Esther Z Greenberg visiting scholar at OMRF in Oklahoma. He is a professor of Blood Coagulation Research at Lund University since 1989.

Dr. Dahlbäck is best known for his groundbreaking discovery of activated protein C (APC) resistance as the most common inherited risk factor of venous thrombosis. He showed APC resistance to be caused by a change in the FV gene, the mutation was subsequently identified by several groups and now referred to as FVLeiden. Another more recent breakthrough is the elucidation of a bleeding disorder called East Texas Bleeding. It is caused by a point mutation in the FV gene that activates a splice donor site that causes an in-frame deletion of 702 amino acids from the B domain. The resulting FV-Short exposes a high-affinity binding site for TFPIa. The FV-TFPIa complex is retained in the circulation and causes the bleeding phenotype. Recently, he has shown that FV-Short and protein S are synergistic cofactors to TFPIa in inhibition of FXa. Other achievements include the first purification of human FV, the discovery of the complex between protein S and the complement regulator C4BP, identification and cloning of the protein S-binding beta-chain of C4BP, electron microscopy visualization of the spider-like C4BP, sequencing and cloning of protein S, and the creation of Gas6 knockout mice. A noteworthy achievement outside the coagulation field is the identification of apoM, an HDL-associated apolipoprotein, and the discovery that it is the carrier of sphingosine 1- phosphate in the blood.

In recognition of his research contributions, Dr. Dahlbäck has received many honors and awards; the Louis Jeantet Prix de Medicine, the Göran Gustafsson’s prize, the Analytical Biochemistry Prize, the Werkö prize, the Söderberg Award, the Berend Houwen Award, the Ham-Wasserman lecture award and the William Dameshek Prize from ASH, Distinguished Career Award and Investigator Recognition Award from the ISTH and His Majesty the King’s medal. He is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Science and an honorary member of the ASH. He is presently Treasurer of the ISTH.