Claes Wahlestedt

Biography

Claes Wahlestedt, M.D., Ph.D., an internationally recognized researcher of drug therapies for neuropsychiatric disorders and epigenetics, is the director of the Center for Therapeutic Innovation and associate dean for therapeutic innovations. Wahlestedt has a long-standing interest in non-protein-coding RNA (epigenetics) and pioneered various uses of antisense RNA, siRNA and small molecules that target RNA. He also spent more than a decade directing drug discovery or genomics efforts in the pharmaceutical industry for Astra-Zeneca, Pharmacia & Upjohn, and Pharmacia Corporation. Wahlestedt is a founding member and professor of neuroscience and molecular therapeutics at the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute, was also a founding director of the Center for Genomics and Bioinformatics and a department chair at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. At Scripps Florida, he co-founded CURNA, a spin-off company based on his patent for exploiting a cell’s ability to make therapeutic RNAs, a discovery that holds promise for potential treatments for such diseases as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Wahlestedt was also an assistant professor in the Division of Neurobiology, Department of Neurology and Neuroscience, at Cornell University Medical College in New York, and was subsequently adjunct professor of biochemistry, and pharmacology and therapeutics at McGill University in Montreal.  

Research Interest

drug therapies for neuropsychiatric disorders and epigenetics