Colleagues
Charlotte Begby, Executive Office Manager
39 years. Charlotte is a qualified Medical Secretary she has studied at the University of Oslo and Folkeuniversitetet taken the Examen Philosophicum and read psychology and sociology. She became a State Registered Medical Secretary in 2008. For the past 17 years she has worked as a nursing assistant and medical secretary at several medical units in Norway’s largest teaching hospital, Ullevål. Together with her studies she has worked in the cancer nursing department, cardiac intensive care, medical wards, haematology dept on a full-time and part-time basis. For the past 9 years Charlotte has worked at the out-patients dep. of the Physical Medicine unit and the out-patients dep. for Acute and Chronic back problems, Ullevål University teaching hospital. In addition, Charlotte has held a secondary post involving responsibility for medical student studies at the Back Clinic, UiO.
Jan Økern, Chief Executive Officer
59 years. Mr Økern has a M.Sc., majoring in geophysics with supplementary mathematics from the University of Oslo. Mr Økern has long and varied experience in working with and leading ‘start-up’ companies. Among others he started Intergraph in Norway which has become a world leader in the field of computer-assisted construction. He has been a company consultant in the PA Consulting Group working with leadership and motivation. He started JBR Advertising Agency which was voted best agency within a short period of time and he went on to start and lead Dinamo which was voted the largest and best communication agency by the magazine ‘Kapital’ in 1999. Jan was one of the architects of re-shaping an Oslo professional football club, Stabæk where he served on the Board for 15 years. In addition he has leadership experience of companies in oil, trading and financing.
Michael Thorp, Director of R&D
47 years. Thorp was born and grew up in Malaysia with an English father and Norwegian mother. He is a medical doctor educated at the University of Oslo he has worked as a general practitioner and as a public health doctor for several years. He is a medical specialist in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. He has worked at the TRS competence centre dealing with rare illnesses at Sunnaas Hospital in the Spinal Cord Injuries section. Thorp worked in the Neck/Back clinic as well as in the Neurological Dept. at Ullevål University Teaching Hospital, Oslo. For many years he has been engaged in nutrition and dietary matters, and he has lectured and arranged courses concerning the correctness of diet. He has worked in the field of sports medicine and he was doctor for a sports branch of the Norwegian Sports Association. Thorp is on the Board of NFFR (Norwegian Association for Physical and Rehabilation Medicine) Thorp is also a member of the Norwegian Red Cross ERU (Emergency Response Unit) and has experience from working in acute help to catastrophe areas (earthquakes) and more long-term emergency help.
Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam, M.D. P.hD.
40 years. He was born in Iran and he has lived in Norway since 1985. He is a doctor of medicine, educated at the University of Oslo. In 2004 he was awarded his Ph.D for work relating to brain research at UiO. The same year he was awarded the King’s gold medal for the best medical Ph.D. He continued at the UiO as a post- doctorate and then as a researcher. In 2006 he worked as a post doctorate at Harvard Medical School. In 2008 he was awarded the Anders Jahre’s prize in medicine for young researchers and the following year was elected as a member of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. He is part of a worldwide network of leading researchers in various fields. Today he heads the laboratory for neurological science at UiO.
Laura M.A. Camassa, Ph.D.
36 years. Laura was born and grew up in Italy. She has a Ph.D in neurological science from the University of Oslo. She studied for her Bachelor degree in Bio-molecular biology at the University of Bari in Italy and for several years worked at the Department of General and Environmental Physiology with Mario Svelto at Bari University. She has worked as visiting researcher at the laboratory of Prof. David Spray at the faculty of Neuro-Sciences at the A.Einstein College of Medicine, University of New York. In 2005 she started her work with the University of Oslo and was awarded the European Madam Curie prize. In Oslo she worked with Ole Petter Ottersen at the centre for Molecular Biology and Neurological Science and then she joined Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam. In 2006 she started her doctorate studies as a research assistant at the above centre attached to the Faculty of Anatomy at UiO, her doctorate: “The pathophysiological role of Aquaporins in the central nervous system.”
Eirik Grude Flekkøy,professor of physics, University of Oslo
48 years. He achieved his Ph.D from the University of Oslo in 1993 and worked for the following two years as a post doctoral researcher at MIT Massachusetts and ESPCI in Paris. In Norway he has spent 2 years as a researcher at the Centre for Advanced Study, Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters. He was appointed professor at the University of Oslo and spent his research year at the University of Honolulu. His speciality in physics covers complex systems, statistical physics and hydrodynamics. This field includes special fluid-particle systems, their dynamic and thermodynamic properties. Flekkøy has also worked in the oil technology company, Petromarker from 2008 – 2011, where he assisted in the technological development and understanding of the physical properties of the company’s products. For the past 10 years Flekkøy has been a popular scientific presenter on radio and TV, newspapers and journals and he has written and contributed in the publication of three popular-science books. He has published 74 scientific papers in science journals. He has been the President of a physics section of the Norwegian Physics Society, he has led and organised three international conferences and been a group leader of AMKS comprising 35 colleagues. He has been awarded more than NOK10 million in stipends during the past 5 years for research work at the UiO.
Knut Jørgen Måløy, professor of physics
51 years. Måløy took his degree in experimental physics at the University of Oslo in 1985 followed by his dr.scient degree in condensed matter physics also at the UiO in 1989. In 1991/92 he took up post doctoral work at the University of Pittsburgh. He started a research position at UiO in 1993 and was appointed professor in May 1993. Måløy works experimentally in the field of the physics of complex systems. In his field he works with X-Rays, light, infra-red light, super-speed photography, optical instrumentation and microscopy. Måløy is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters, Norwegian/European Physical Society and American Physical Society. He has published more than 100 scientific papers in international journals and his work has been referenced more than 1,700 times. Måløy has been guest professor at the University of Rennes, the University of Strasbourg and the Ecole Normale Superioure in Paris. Since 2008 Måløy has been working part-time with PetroMarker as a geo-physicist.
Frode Rise, professor in chemistry
56 years. Rise took his chemistry degree in Bergen and Oslo and followed this in the University of Oslo (UiO) by completing his PH.D in organic chemistry and in 1985/86 he was awarded a NATO stipend to the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Subsequently he joined the University of Uppsala as assistant professor. Later he joined the pharmeceuticals companies, Hafslund Nycomed Innovation in Malmø and Salutar Inc. In San Jose. Rise returned to Norway to the Chemistry Institute of UiO as senior researcher and spent a year at Yale University, New Haven, again financed by NATO. He studied new advanced NMR-techniques. Rise is now professor of organic chemistry and the nuclear magnetic resonance studies of UiO. He is also the head of the University of Oslo NMR Centre and heads the Norwegian Society for Magnetic Resonance (NSMR) Rise has been a member of the American Chemical Society for more than 25 years and further is a member of the Swedish Chemist Society and the Norwegian Chemist Society.