Rainer Blasczyk (born January 8, 1962 in

Castrop-Rauxel Castrop-Rauxel (), often simply referred to as Castrop by locals, is a former coal mining city in the eastern part of the Ruhr Area in Germany. Geography Castrop-Rauxel is located in Germany between Dortmund to the southeast, Bochum to the sout ...

) is a German physician for

transfusion medicine Transfusion medicine (or transfusiology) is the branch of medicine that encompasses all aspects of the transfusion of blood and blood components including aspects related to hemovigilance. It includes issues of blood donation, immunohematology ...

specialized in

histocompatibility Histocompatibility, or tissue compatibility, is the property of having the same, or sufficiently similar, alleles of a set of genes called human leukocyte antigens (HLA), or major histocompatibility complex (MHC). Each individual expresses many uni ...

and

immunogenetics Immunogenetics or immungenetics is the branch of Medical Immunology and Medical Genetics that explores the relationship between the immune system and genetics. Autoimmune diseases, such as type 1 diabetes, are complex genetic traits which result ...

in the field of

organ transplantation Organ transplantation is a medical procedure in which an organ (anatomy), organ is removed from one body and placed in the body of a recipient, to replace a damaged or missing organ. The donor and recipient may be at the same location, or organ ...

. He is known for the development of

genetic engineering Genetic engineering, also called genetic modification or genetic manipulation, is the modification and manipulation of an organism's genes using technology. It is a set of technologies used to change the genetic makeup of cells, including t ...

allografts Allotransplant (''allo-'' meaning "other" in Greek) is the transplantation of cells, tissues, or organs to a recipient from a genetically non-identical donor of the same species. The transplant is called an allograft, allogeneic transplant, or ...

to prevent

organ rejection Transplant rejection occurs when transplanted tissue is rejected by the recipient's immune system, which destroys the transplanted tissue. Transplant rejection can be lessened by determining the molecular similitude between donor and recipient a ...

Career

Blasczyk holds a professorship in the subject at

Hannover Medical School The Hannover Medical SchoolAlthough the English spelling of the city name is "Hanover", this form of the name, using the German spelling of the city name, is used as the English-language name of the school, for example . (german: Medizinische Ho ...

and the directorship of the institute of transfusion medicine and

transplant engineering Transplant engineering (or allograft engineering) is a variant of genetic organ engineering which comprises allograft, autograft and xenograft engineering. In allograft engineering the graft is substantially modified by altering its genetic composit ...

since 1998. He graduated in Medicine at the

University of Essen The University of Duisburg-Essen (german: link=no, Universität Duisburg-Essen) is a public research university in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. In the 2019 ''Times Higher Education World University Rankings'', the university was awarded ...

in 1987 and began his clinical education as a junior clinician in abdominal surgery at the

University of Marburg The Philipps University of Marburg (german: Philipps-Universität Marburg) was founded in 1527 by Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse, which makes it one of Germany's oldest universities and the oldest still operating Protestant university in the wor ...

, where his interest in organ transplantation evolved. In 1988, he moved to the institute of immunology at the University of Essen, where he started to work in the field of histocompatibility and immunogenetics. From 1991 to 1993 he continued his clinical education in hematology and oncology at the

University of Duesseldorf A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase ''universitas magistrorum et scholarium'', which rou ...

. Following these clinical years he returned to the field of immunology in 1993 at the institute of transfusion medicine,

Humboldt-University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of ...

, where he started to work on molecular immunogenetics. Blasczyk was president of the German Society for Immunogenetics (DGI) from 2006-2008 and 2012-2014, president of the German Society of Transfusion Medicine and Immunohematology (DGTI) from 2015-2016, served as a board member of the

European Federation for Immunogenetics The European Federation for Immunogenetics (EFI) is the European association of people with interests in the field of immunogenetics. History of the EFI During the early 1980s, members of the Committee created a more formal organisation and the o ...

(EFI) from 2008-2010 and as transplantation specialist on its advisory board from 2009-2019. Blasczyk is editor of the journal Transfusion Medicine and member of the editorial board of the journal ''HLA''. From 2016-2019, he has been an appointed member of the Advisory Board on Blood Products of the German Federal Ministry of Health.

Work

The scientific work of Blasczyk is focused on the

alloimmune Alloimmunity (sometimes called isoimmunity) is an immune response to nonself antigens from members of the same species, which are called alloantigens or isoantigens. Two major types of alloantigens are blood group antigens and histocompatibility an ...

response in transplantation and strategies to combat

. Together with Constanca Figueiredo, he initiated the research on transplant engineering by genetically modifying

during their inevitable

ex vivo ''Ex vivo'' (Latin: "out of the living") literally means that which takes place outside an organism. In science, ''ex vivo'' refers to experimentation or measurements done in or on tissue from an organism in an external environment with minimal ...

period after explantation in such a way that they become permanently invisible to the recipient's

immune system The immune system is a network of biological processes that protects an organism from diseases. It detects and responds to a wide variety of pathogens, from viruses to parasitic worms, as well as cancer cells and objects such as wood splinte ...

and are prevented from rejection. Since 2018, Blasczyk has been head of the research consortium on invisible organs, an innovation network funded jointly by the

European Regional Development Fund The European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) is one of the European Structural and Investment Funds allocated by the European Union. Its purpose is to transfer money from richer regions (not countries), and invest it in the infrastructure and se ...

and the state of

Lower Saxony Lower Saxony (german: Niedersachsen ; nds, Neddersassen; stq, Läichsaksen) is a German state (') in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with , and fourth-largest in population (8 million in 2021) among the 16 ...

, Germany.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blasczyk, Rainer Living people German immunologists People from Castrop-Rauxel Physicians from Hanover 1962 births