Erlend B. Smeland

The aim of our research group is to improve the understanding of malignant B cell lymphoma in order to develop new diagnostic tools and to improve treatment of this group of diseases.

Malignant lymphomas represent a diagnostic and therapeutic challenge with considerable heterogeneity in the clinical behavior even within the different subgroups. We use high throughput analysis of gene expression and genomic and epigenetic alterations in lymphoma samples and correlate the findings with clinical data in collaboration with the Lymphoma program at our hospital. We also perform functional studies and focus on the role of the BMP/TGF-beta and PI3 kinase signal transduction pathways in normal and neoplastic B cells.

We cooperate primarily with Lothes group and Liestøl/Lingjærdes group within CCB. The lymphoma milieu at our hospital is involved in a broad international collaboration headed by L. Staudt at NCI as one of eight centres (The Leukemia and Lymphoma Molecular Profiling Project, Smeland is site-PI for this project).