Biography
Dr. Kovanen has received his M.D. degree (1970) at the University of Basle, Switzerland, and then (1975) his M.D, Ph.D degree at the University of Helsinki, Finland. He conducted his postdoctoral work (1976 – 1980) at the University of Texas, Health Science Center at Dallas, Department of Medicine and Department of Molecular Genetics (heads: Nobel Laureates Joseph L. Goldstein and Michael S. Brown). His main achievement in Dallas was to unravel the mechanism of statin-induced lowering of plasma LDL-cholesterol level in vivo.
After his return to Finland, he completed his residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Helsinki. In 1984 he was appointed as Scientific Director of Wihuri Research Institute, Helsinki, and since 1997 he is the Director of the Institute.
Dr. Kovanen was the Editor-in-Chief of Annals of Medicine (1995-2008), and has served on the Editorial Board of Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology. He has served as a Council Member of the Scandinavian Society for Atherosclerosis Research, as a Councillor of the European Vascular Biology Organization, and also as the 1st President of Finnish Atherosclerosis Society. Dr. Kovanen is the Editor of the Cell Biology and Lipoproteins section of Current Opinion in Lipidology.
Most importantly, Dr. Kovanen has been a member of EAS since 1995; he has been the Society’s Secretary since January 2009, and is the current Chair of the Society’s Scientific Committee. As a member of the Organizing Committee and as the Press Officer of the 76th EAS Congress held in Helsinki 2007, and the Scientific Programme Committee Chair for the 79th EAS Congress held in Gothenburg 2011 and for the 80th EAS Congress to be held in Milan 2012, he has made major contributions to the success of the Society’s annual meetings. Dr. Kovanen has also been active on behalf of EAS teaching vascular biology to students attending EAS Summer School and EAS Advanced Course in Clinical Lipidology.