PD Dr. Anke Kraft participates in research project B8.

My Research Interest in RESIST

Our research focus within RESIST is to understand the heterogeneity of virus-specific T cell responses in chronic viral infections and how to efficiently restore their responses to overcome chronicity. The long-term goal is to identify mechanisms and biomarkers that enable the prediction of cure. To achieve this, we focus on chronic infections with the hepatitis B virus (HBV). We study the immune responses of patients in the different phases of chronic HBV infection as well as of patients with controlled interruption of HBV antiviral therapy with nucleoside or nucleotide analogues.

In pursuing this research goal, we build on our experience in studying exhausted T cell responses. We have worked over the last two decades on the characterization and immunomodulation of immune responses in chronic viral infections (e.g. LCMV, MCMV and hepatitis B, C and E virus) in humans and mice.

PD Dr. Anke Kraft

PD Dr. Anke Kraft – Curriculum Vitae

Current Position

Group leader at the Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, Infectious Diseases and Endocrinology, MHH

Undergraduate and Postgraduate Training

1994 – 2000 academic studies of biology, Technical University Carola-Wilhelmina Braunschweig, Germany and Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany
2000-2003 PhD thesis (Dr.rer.nat.; supervisor Prof. Dr. Ulf Dittmer, University of Würzburg, Germany)
2018: ‘Habilitation’ and award of the Venia legendi for „Experimental Medicine“ at Medical School Hannover, Title: ‚Development of new concepts for immunotherapy against viral infections’

Academic and Research Posts

2003 – 2006: Post-Doc, University of Essen, Germany
2006 – 2010: Post-Doc, University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, USA
2010 – 2013: Independent Junior Research Group University of Essen-Duisburg, Germany
2013 – 2018: Senior scientist and head of the research laboratory, AG Prof. Dr. Heiner Wedemeyer/ PD Dr. Markus Cornberg, Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Endocrinology, Hannover Medical School
Since 2018: Group leader together with Prof. Markus Cornberg ‘Immunology of Viral Hepatitis and Infections in Liver Cirrhosis’, Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, Infectious Diseases and Endocrinology, Hannover Medical School

Other Scientific Roles

Since 2010 Member of the German Society for Virology (GfV, Germany)
2015-17/ 2019-24 Member of the German Association for the Study of the Liver (GASL, Germany)
2017-2018 Member of the review committee Dr.rer.nat. at Medical School Hannover, Germany
Since 2019 Member of the review committee M.Sc. Biomedizin at Medical School Hannover, Germany
Since 2022 Member of the German Society for Immunology (DGFI, Germany)

10 Selected Publications

Niehaus C, Klein S, Strunz B, Freyer E, Maasoumy B, Wedemeyer H, Björkström NK, Kraft ARM, Cornberg M. CXCR6+CD69+ CD8+ T cells in ascites are associated with disease severity in patients with cirrhosis. JHEP Rep. 2024 Mar 24;6(6):101074. doi: 10.1016/j.jhepr.2024.101074. PMID: 38882602; PMCID: PMC11179582.

Shahi Dost*, Ariam Rivas*, Hanan Begali*, Annett Ziegler, Elimira Aliabadi, Markus Cornberg, Anke RM Kraft*, and Maria-Esther Vidal*. 2023. Unraveling the Hepatitis B Cure: A Hybrid AI Approach for Capturing Knowledge about the Immune System’s Impact. In Proceedings of the 12th Knowledge Capture Conference 2023 (K-CAP ’23). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 241–249. https://doi.org/10.1145/3587259.3627558 *Authors contributed equally

Klein S, Mischke J, Beruldsen F, Prinz I, Antunes DA, Cornberg M, Kraft ARM. Individual Epitope-Specific CD8+ T Cell Immune Responses Are Shaped Differently during Chronic Viral Infection. Pathogens. 2023 May 14;12(5):716. doi: 10.3390/pathogens12050716.

Walker A, Schwarz T, Brinkmann-Paulukat J, Wisskirchen K, Menne C, Alizei ES, Kefalakes H, Theissen M, Hoffmann D, Schulze Zur Wiesch J, Maini MK, Cornberg M, Kraft AR, Keitel V, Bock HH, Horn PA, Thimme R, Wedemeyer H, Heinemann FM, Luedde T, Neumann-Haefelin C, Protzer U, Timm J. Immune escape pathways from the HBV core18-27 CD8 T cell response are driven by individual HLA class I alleles. Front Immunol. 2022 Nov 10;13:1045498. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2022.1045498.

Aliabadi E, Urbanek-Quaing M, Maasoumy B, Bremer B, Grasshoff M, Li Y, Niehaus CE, Wedemeyer H, Kraft ARM*, Cornberg M*. Impact of HBsAg and HBcrAg levels on phenotype and function of HBV-specific T cells in patients with chronic hepatitis B virus infection. Gut. 2022 Nov;71(11):2300-2312. doi: 10.1136/gutjnl-2021-324646. *Authors contributed equally

Oltmanns C, Liu Z, Mischke J, Tauwaldt J, Mekonnen YA, Urbanek-Quaing M, Debarry J, Maasoumy B, Wedemeyer H, Kraft ARM, Xu CJ, Cornberg M. Reverse inflammaging: Long-term effects of HCV cure on biological age. J Hepatol. 2022 Sep 21:S0168-8278(22)03115-4. doi: 10.1016/j.jhep.2022.08.042.

Niehaus CE, Strunz B, Cornillet M, Falk CS, Schnieders A, Maasoumy B, Hardtke S, Manns MP, Kraft ARM*, Björkström NK*, Cornberg M*. MAIT Cells Are Enriched and Highly Functional in Ascites of Patients With Decompensated Liver Cirrhosis. Hepatology. 2020 Oct;72(4):1378-1393. doi: 10.1002/hep.31153. Epub 2020 Oct 13. PMID: 32012321. *Authors contributed equally

Rinker F, Zimmer CL, Höner Zu Siederdissen C, Manns MP, Kraft ARM, Wedemeyer H, Björkström NK, Cornberg M. Hepatitis B virus-specific T cell responses after stopping nucleos(t)ide analogue therapy in HBeAg-negative chronic hepatitis B. J Hepatol. 2018 Sep;69(3):584-593. doi: 10.1016/j.jhep.2018.05.004. Epub 2018 Jun 29. PMID: 29758333.

Al-Ayoubi J, Behrendt P, Bremer B, Suneetha PV, Gisa A, Rinker F, Manns MP, Cornberg M, Wedemeyer H, Kraft ARM. Hepatitis E virus ORF 1 induces proliferative and functional T-cell responses in patients with ongoing and resolved hepatitis E. Liver Int. 2018 Feb;38(2):266-277. doi: 10.1111/liv.13521. Epub 2017 Aug 20. PMID: 28718943.

Höner Zu Siederdissen C, Rinker F, Maasoumy B, Wiegand SB, Filmann N, Falk CS, Deterding K, Port K, Mix C, Manns MP, Herrmann E, Wedemeyer H, Kraft AR, Cornberg M. Viral and Host Responses After Stopping Long-term Nucleos(t)ide Analogue Therapy in HBeAg-Negative Chronic Hepatitis B. J Infect Dis. 2016 Nov 15;214(10):1492-1497. doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiw412. Epub 2016 Sep 7. PMID: 27609808.

Contact

	PD Dr. Anke Kraft
	Hannover Medical School Dept. of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, Infektionology and Endokrinologie
	Carl-Neuberg-Str. 1 30625 Hannover
	+49 511 532 – 7211
	kraft.anke@ mh-hannover.de