Curriculum vitae

Personal details

• Mustjoki Satu Maarit, 08.01.1972 (date of birth), Finnish (nationality)
• ORCID: 0000-0002-0816-8241
• Website: helsinki.fi/hematology and www.helsinki.fi/TRIMM
• Date of the CV: 03 Jan 2025

Degrees

• 2011 Adj. professor (docent), Experimental hematology, University of Helsinki (UH), Finland
• 2008 Specialist in Clinical Chemistry (Laboratory Hematology), UH, Finland
• 2001 PhD, UH, Finland, PhD Thesis with honor
• 1997 MD, UH, Finland

Current employment

• 8.2022- Scientific Director, iCAN national R&D flagship, UH & HUS university hospital, Finland
• 1.2019- Director of Translational Immunology Research Program, UH, Finland
• 9.2017- Professor of Translational Hematology (100%), UH, Finland.
• 4.2018- Head of department, Helsinki University Central Hospital (HUCH) Comprehensive Cancer Center, Helsinki, Finland.

Previous work experience

• 2015-2017 Research professor for the Finnish Cancer Institute
• 2015-2017 Deputy professor of Clinical Chemistry and Hematology (35% position), UH, Finland
• 2012-2015 Specialist doctor (5% position), HUCH Comprehensive Cancer Center, Finland
• 2010-2014 Senior Research fellow (Academy of Finland), HUCH, Finland
• 2008-2010 Academy Clinical Researcher, HUCH, Helsinki, Finland
• 2007-2007 Resident in hematology, Dept. of Medicine, HUCH, Helsinki, Finland (4 months)
• 2006-2006 Clinical lecturer, Dept. of Clinical Chemistry, UH, Finland (6 months)
• 2002-2006 Resident in Clinical Chemistry, Laboratory of Hematology, HUCH, Helsinki, Finland
• 2001-2002 Post-Doc researcher, Molecular Cancer Biology (Group prof. K. Alitalo), UH (12m)
• 1995-2000 PhD student, Dept. of Virology (Cancer biology group prof. A. Vaheri), UH, Finland

Research funding and grants (last 5 years)

• EPPerMed European Partnership for Personalized Medicine consortium, 2025 – 2027, 350K €
• Leukemia and Lymphoma society, 2023-2026, 750K € (Co-PI with Dr. C. Mitsiades)
• Academy of Finland and NIH joint funding and NIH R01 CA276156, 2023-2027, 750K €
• Jane and Aatos Erkko Foundation, 2023-2026 ,1 636 000 €
• Sigrid Juselius Foundation 2023-2025 110K €/year; 2020-2023, 80K €/year; 2017- 75K €/year
• Finnish Cancer Organizations 2023-2025, 450K€; 2020-2022, 450K€; 2017-2019, 450K€
• HiLife Fellow 2023-2025, 150K€; 2017-2020, 180K€
• Special Funding for University level Health Research 2024-2026 182K€, 2023-2024 176K€; 2021-2023, 220K €; 2014-2020, 437K €
• Academy of Finland project funding, 2020-2024, 752 866 €
• Academy of Finland Terva (Consortium PI), 2021-2022, 296 785€; 2018-2020 533 739€
• Business Finland Cancer IO consortium, 2020-2022, 430 613€
• Pfizer investigator initiated grant, 2020-2022, 298 179€
• Academy of Finland Covid-19 special funding, 2020-2022, 277 958 €
• European Research Council (ERC) consolidator grant 2015-2020, 2 047 000€
• ERC proof-of-concept grant 2020-2021, 150K €
• Nordic Cancer Union 2025 60K €, 2021 65K €, 2020 65K €; 2019 65K €
• EraPerMed (EU consortium PI), 2019-2021 566 217€ (whole consortium 1 562 420€)
• Pfizer investigator initiated grant for Nordic biomarker program, 2019-2024, 440K €
• Novartis investigator initiated grant 2017-2020, 400K €; 2019-2022 289K €

Research output

• Peer-reviewed publications:209 (155 since 2015, 194 original articles, 15 reviews). Last/corresponding author: Patent application: 1. H-index: 53.
• Complete List of Published Work: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=mustjoki

Research supervision and leadership experience

• Leader of research work: Scientific Director of iCAN Digital Precision Cancer Medicine Flagship, University of Helsinki and Helsinki University Hospital 2022-2026; Program leader of Translational Immunology research program, University of Helsinki 2019-2025; Consortium PI Heal-Art Academy of Finland Terva project 2018-2022; Consortium PI EraPerMed EU project 2019-2023
• Supervisor of Post-Doctoral/Senior researchers: Altogether 18, 9 completed and 9 ongoing

• Supervisor in PhD thesis: PhD A. Kreutzman (2012, thesis with honor, “Antileukemic immune responses in CML”), PhD S. Hernesniemi (2012, “ Aberrant kinase activation as a therapy target: CML as a model disease”), MD, PhD H. Rajala (2014, best thesis of the year, “ Molecular pathogenesis of LGL leukemia”), PhD M. Ilander (2016, “ T and NK cell mediated immunity in CML”), PhD E. Andersson (2017, “Characterization of mature T-cell leukemias by  next-generation sequencing and drug sensitivity testing”), PhD P. Pietarinen (2017, “Effects of genotype and phenotype in personalized drug therapy”), MD, PhD M. El Missiry (2017, “Early Treatment Prediction and Immunological Effects of TKI Therapy in CML”), MD, PhD S. Söderlund (2017, “Clinical and Immunological studies in CML”). PhD H. Kuusanmäki (2018, “Targeting key survival signaling pathways in leukemia”), PhD P. Savola (2019, Somatic mutations in autoimmunity). PhD V. Gasparini (2021, “Evaluation of the genomic landscape in rare mature lymphoproliferative disorders”). PhD S. A. Awad (2021, “Integrative genomic and drug sensitivity profiling of High-Risk CML Patients”). PhD O. Bruck (2021, “Immunoprofiling and texture analysis of myeloid malignancies with computational histopathology”). PhD D. Kim (2022, “Functional effects of somatic mutations in T lymphocytes and human health”). MD, PhD O. Dufva (2022, “Functional immunogenomics in hematological malignancies”, honor grade). MD, PhD H. Hohtari (2023, “Biological characterization of Philadelphia chromosome-positive acute lymphoblastic leukemia”, honor grade). PhD M. H. Lee (2023, “The immunological profile of renal cell carcinoma patients”). PhD D. Bhattacharya (2023, ” Clonally expanded T cells in T cell large granular lymphocytic leukemia and immune-mediated arthritis”). PhD H. Kasanen (2023, “The effects of novel immune checkpoint inhibitors on melanoma patient´s immune system”). MD, PhD J. Huuhtanen (2024, “Immunomonitoring in Cancer and Autoimmune Disorders at the Single-Cell level”, honor grade). MD, PhD S. Lundgren (2024, “Somatic mutations and aberrant immune responses in aplastic anemia). Currently ongoing 13 PhD thesis supervisions.

• Supervisor in MSc and MD thesis: 
  MSc M. Ilander (2011), MSc E. Andersson (2012), MD K. Penttinen (2012), MSc S. Bortoluzzi (2015), MD E. Vakkila (2016), MD J. Eskelinen (2016), MSc H. Hakanen (2016), V. Gasparini 2016 (Univ. of Padua, Italy), M. Lee (2017), P. Savola (2018), O. Dufva (2020), S. Lundgren (2020), M. Tyster (2021), J. Huuhtanen (2021), I. Uski (2021), E. Piekkari (2022), O. Brummer (2022), N. Sirc (2022), P. Nygren (2022), J. Theodoropoulos (2022), M. Alakuijala (2022), J. Bouhlal (2022)

Teaching merits

• 2017- Prof. of Translational Hematology, Department of Clinical Chemistry and Hematology, UH, Finland (Curriculum, planning of the tuition, lecturing, educational materials)
• 2018–2021 Vice director, Doctoral Program in Biomedicine, UH, Finland (Curriculum, educational administration)
• 2018- Board member, MD/PhD Program, UH, Finland (Curriculum, educational administration)
• 2015-2020 Deputy prof. in Clinical Chemistry and Hematology responsible for undergraduate studies (medicine) and specialist training in the UH, Finland
• 2013–2017 Vice director, Doctoral Program in Clinical Research, UH, Finland (Curriculum, educational administration)
• 2010–Lecturer in Biomedical Graduate school and Specialist training courses
• 2013– Invited lecturerin the educational sessions in the international conferences
• 2006–2007 Clinical lecturer, of Clinical Chemistry, UH, Finland
• 2010– Thesis committee memberfor >20 PhD students

Awards and honours

• 2024 Medix Prize of the Minerva Foundation (best Life Science publication in 2023)
• 2020 City of Helsinki Science award
• 2023-2025 and 2017-2020 Helsinki Institute of Life Science (HiLife) Fellow
• 2019 ERC Proof-of-Concept awardee
• 2018 Biomedicum Helsinki award
• 2015 ERC Consolidator grant awardee
• 2014 Instrumentarium Science foundation fellow award
• 2010-2015 Academy of Finland Senior research and 2008-2010 Clinical researcher fellowship
• 2001 PhD thesis accepted with distinction

Other key academic merits

• Chair, Vice chair and memberof the American Society of Hematology (ASH) myeloid neoplasia scientific committee (2016-2021)
• Member of Scientific program committee of European Hematology Association (EHA) (2021-)
• Member of European School of Hematology (ESH) scientific committee (2022-)
• Opponent of a Doctoral dissertation (University of Nottingham, 2022)
• Pre-examinerof a Doctoral dissertation 4 times (2014, 2015, 2016, 2024)
• Pre-examiner of docentship applications (2017, 2019, 2021)
• Pre-examiner of international professorship applications (2016, 2017, 2018, 2x2019, 2023)
• PIor study steering group member in 3 international academic clinical studies (2009-)
• PIin 9 international biomarker programs in association with clinical studies (2009-)
• Sub-investigatorin 24 international clinical trials in hematological malignancies (2007-)
• Member of the Editorial Board: Leukemia (2023-), International Trends in Immunity (2013-) and Cytokine (2014-)
• Peer reviewof international funding applications (examples ERC CoG, Swiss Cancer research, UK Cancer research, Austria Science Foundation, Leuka JG Fellowship, Dutch Cancer Society KWF and scientific publications (examples New Engl J Med, Nature Cancer, Nature Reviews Rheumatology, Nature Communications, Cell Reports Medicine, Lancet Haematology, Blood)
• Abstract reviewerfor the EHA and ASH conferences (2011, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2018-2024)
• Several invited lecturesyearly in international conferences and institutes (selected examples from 2023-2025): 2025 Keystone symposium Somatic Mosaicism in Human Development, Aging, and Diseases, USA; 2025 21st Meeting of the Society for Natural Immunity, Australia; 2025 International conference on immune checkpoints, Germany; 2024 EMBO workshop in childhood cancer, Germany; 2024 German Society of Immunology NK/ILC cell symposium, France; 2024 Transplantation and Cellular TherapyMeetings of ASTCT and CIBMTR, USA; 2024 CRCI²NA Cancer&Immunology symposium, France; 2023 European Society of Human Genetics conference, UK; 2023 Childhood Aplastic Anemia/MDS Study Group meeting, Japan
• Board memberof the Nordic CML study group (2010-), the Finnish Society of Hematology (2006-2010), Finnish Publication forum promoting open science (2018-2021)
• Memberships in professional societies: Finnish Medical Association, 1993-; Finnish Society of Hematology, 2002-; The American Society of Hematology, 2008-; The European Society of Hematology, 2008-; The American Society of Cancer Research, 2020-

Scientific and societal impact

• Discovery of STAT3 mutations in T-LGL leukemia, which is now incorporated in the WHO disease classification
• Discovery of immunological off-target effect of tyrosine kinase inhibitor therapy (LGL lymphocytosis) which have led to combination clinical trials in solid tumors and blood cancers
• Discovery of novel autoantibody in aplastic anemia that can be applied in diagnostics (patent application)
• Discovery of somatic mutationsin normal non-malignant T cells which affect T cell function
• Societal impact:TV and newspaper interviews and articles popularizing science, patient advocacy meetings and in the development of nationwide biobank of hematologic cancers

Other

• 2018- Board member of the Faculty of Medicine Research council, UH, Finland
• 2022- Deputy member of the Faculty council, UH, Finland