ME/CFS Research Foundation appoints Scientific Advisory Board

An advisory board of international ME/CFS experts advises the foundation on its future funding of biomedical research projects.

We are more than happy to announce that eight leading researchers have joined the ME/CFS Research Foundation's Scientific Advisory Board. The advisory board strengthens the scientific expertise of the foundation. Its main task is to advise on the allocation of funding for potential research projects.

The advisory board includes renowned scientists from the Netherlands, Norway, England, Poland, Portugal and Austria who have been researching and publishing in the field of ME/CFS for many years and are internationally well networked. The broad spectrum of their experience ranges from basic research to clinical research to biostatistics and thus fits very well with the focus of the foundation – the promotion of biomedical research on ME/CFS, which as a post-infectious neuro-immunological disease also occurs, among other things, as the most severe form of post-COVID.

The members of the Scientific Advisory Board are (in alphabetical order):

• Jeroen den Dunnen, Immunologist and Principal Investigator, Center for Experimental and Molecular Medicine (CEMM), Amsterdam UMC, The Netherlands
• Øystein Fluge, Senior Consultant, Department of Oncology and Medical Physics, Haukeland University Hospital, University of Bergen, Norway
• Eliana Lacerda, Clinical Assistant Professor, CureME Research Group – Research Leader, Clinical Research Department, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, UK
• Olav Mella, Professor, ME / CFS research group, Director, Department of Oncology and Medical Physics, Haukeland University Hospital, University of Bergen, Norway
• Nuno Sepúlveda, Visiting Professor, Head of Immune-Stats Group at Faculty of Mathematics and Information Science, Warsaw University of Technology, Poland
• Karl Johan Tronstad, Professor, Department of Biomedicine, Tronstad Lab, University of Bergen, Norway
• Francisco Westermeier, Senior Lecturer, Institute of Biomedical Science, Department of Health Studies, FH Joanneum University of Applied Sciences, Graz, Austria
• Pawel Zalewski, Associate Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences / Department of Exercise Physiology and Functional Anatomy, Nicolaus Copernicus University Toruń, Poland

Further information on the scientists, links to research institutes and publications, as well as social media profiles, etc., can be found at here on the ME/CFS Research Foundation's website.. Most of the researchers also presented their current projects at the ME/CFS conference at the Charité in May 2023.

During the ME/CFS conference, the ME/CFS Research Foundation's advisory board and management already agreed on the medium-term funding strategy. We will provide more detail here shortly.

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Please note: researchers in Germany are deliberately not represented on the Scientific Advisory Board at this time, yet. Initially, the ME/CFS Research Foundation will focus on research funding in Germany. Any potential conflict of interest of researchers to be funded in Germany are avoided, as they do not advise on the awarding of funding at the same time. As soon as the foundation also funds international projects, the scientific advisory board will be expanded accordingly and will establish adequate mechanisms to avoid potential conflicts of interest in the then larger decisonmaking context. 

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How can you support the work of the ME/CFS Research Foundation?

There is still a long way to go before diagnosis, care and treatment of ME/CFS patients will one day become a medical and social standard. We at the ME/CFS Research Foundation are focussing on biomedical research, which we see as the key element in solving these problems (more on this in our research funding strategy). To do this, we need extensive support from private donors - patients, relatives, families, friends, associations, schools, networks, companies, initiatives, event organisers and all supporters. And if you can't support us directly, maybe you can share our story and motivate others to help. Because only together is such a feat possible.

We fully translate donations and other support into scientifically excellent research, networking and ultimately visible successes, i.e. better ME/CFS diagnostics and therapies. We are happy to work together with other organisations and initiatives - please contact us!