Lars Wiuff Andersen wins 'little Nobel Prize'

Associate Professor Lars Wiuff Andersen from the Department of Clinical Medicine has received this year's Anders Jahre Award for young medical researchers. The prize is awarded by the University of Oslo and is regarded as one of the most prestigious research prizes.

Lars Wiuff Andersen
Photo: Lundbeckfonden

In November, Associate Professor Lars Wiuff Andersen will be presented with the Anders Jahre Award for young medical researchers at a ceremony at the University of Oslo. According to the selection committee, the prize is in recognition of his impressive research results and outstanding studies of the treatment of cardiac arrest.

"I’m honoured to receive the 2022 Anders Jahre Award for young researchers. The prize will help us to continue our research into cardiac arrest," says Lars Wiuff Andersen, who is also a medical doctor at Aarhus University Hospital.

Basic new knowledge about treating cardiac arrest

Lars Wiuff Andersen’s research deals with acute and critical illness, and his work has primarily covered severe infections, cardiac surgery and critically ill patients with cardiac arrest.

Through clinical trials, cohort studies and extensive reviews of previous studies, he has generated basic new knowledge about how best to treat patients with cardiac arrest. His research has resulted in a large number of publications in internationally recognised journals and it has led to changes in the recommended treatment of cardiac arrest.

"Associate Professor Wiuff Andersen has made impressive strides within his field of research. His research results will be enormously important for the prevention and treatment of diseases that affect many people," says Svein Stølen, who is the rector of the University of Oslo and head of the Anders Jahre Foundation.

Meteoric career for this year's award winner

Lars Wiuff Andersen has had a meteoric career. Aged just 34, he already has a PhD and a higher doctoral degree. Moreover, he has won several recognised talent prizes and received large research grants.

While studying medicine, Lars Wiuff Andersen took a research year at Harvard Medical School in Boston. After completing the final examination at Aarhus University in 2013, he returned to Boston, this time as part of his PhD studies, which he carried out in collaboration with the Research Center for Emergency Medicine and the Department of Anaesthesiology at Aarhus University Hospital. During his stay in Boston, Lars Wiuff Andersen also took a Master of Public Health.

In 2021, he published the results of two clinical trials involving patients with cardiac arrest in and outside the hospital. "We’ve been fortunate to establish a national network to study new treatments for patients with cardiac arrest. We’re already working on the next studies, and we hope that we’ll be able to continue generating new knowledge to help patients," says Lars Wiuff Andersen.

Prestigious award

The Anders Jahre Award has been presented by the University of Oslo since 1960 in honour of outstanding clinical research and basic research. The main prize of NOK 1,000,000, and the Anders Jahre Award for young researchers of NOK 400,000 are referred to as the “little Nobel Prize”. And this is what Lars Wiuff Andersen has received.

This is not the first time that the Anders Jahre Award has gone to a researcher from Health. In 2010, Professor Robert Fenton received the award, and Professor Søren Riis Paludan received it in 2011. In 2013, the award went to Christian Brix Folsted Andersen, and Associate Professor Martin Roelsgaard Jakobsen received it in 2019. This year the honour went to Lars Wiuff Andersen. He shares the Anders Jahre Award for young researchers with Associate Professor Lykke Sylow from the University of Copenhagen, while the main prize this year went to Professor Harald Stenmark from the Department of Clinical Medicine at the University of Oslo.

About Lars Wiuff Andersen

  • Associate professor at the Department of Clinical Medicine at Aarhus University
  • Medical doctor at Department of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care at Aarhus University Hospital and affiliated with the Præhospitalet in the Central Denmark Region.
  • Graduated as a medical doctor from Aarhus University in 2013, from where he also has a PhD (2016) and higher doctoral degree (2018).
  • Has received several major awards, including the Lundbeck Foundation Talent Prize in 2016 and the Erhoff Foundation Talent Prize in 2019.
  • Born in 1987 near Ribe and today lives in Aarhus with his wife Lisa Caulley.

Contact

Associate Professor, PhD, MPH and DMSc  Lars Wiuff Andersen
Aarhus University, Department of Clinical Medicine and
Aarhus University Hospital, Department of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care, as well as Præhospitalet
Mobile: +45 51781511
Email: lwandersen@clin.au.dk

This coverage is partly based on press material from the University of Oslo