Dr. Sebastian Schäfer is an Assistant Professor at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore and studied biological engineering in Nuremberg, Busan and Boston at Harvard-MIT. He received his doctoral degree in Genetics from the Max Delbrück Center, Berlin. His research focusses on the human translatome, the IL-6 family of cytokines and antibody therpautics. Sebastian published in Nature, Science, Nature Medicine, and Nature Genetics. As a Founder of Enleofen Bio, a Singapore-based biotech company, his team developed first-in-class antibodies currently in clinical trials.
We have previously uncovered a central role for the cytokine Interleukin 11 in fibrosis and developed antibody therapeutics. My focus is now on the role of cytokine families in acute and chronic conditions with a strong emphasis on drug discovery for inflammatory and ageing diseases.
Another key area of my research involves the comprehensive analysis of RNA translation in humans, providing valuable insights into gene regulation, protein synthesis, and cellular function.
I combine molecular biology, genetics, and bioengineering, to improve our understanding and treatment of disease. My goal is to improve patient outcomes.
1. Chothani S, … Schafer S (2022) A high-resolution map of human RNA translation. Molecular Cell
2. Cook SA, Schafer S (2020) Hiding in Plain Sight: Interleukin-11 Emerges as a Master Regulator of Fibrosis, Tissue Integrity, and Stromal Inflammation. Annual Review of Medicine
3. Ng B, … Schafer S*, Cook SA* (2019) Interleukin-11 is a therapeutic target in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Science Translational Medicine
4. Chothani S*, Schafer S*, Adami E*, Viswanathan S, Widjaja AA, Langley SR, Tan J, Pua CJ, D’Agostino G, et al. (2019) Translational control of cardiac fibrosis. Circulation
5. van Heesch S, Witte F, Schneider-Lunitz V, Schulz JF, Adami E, … Schafer S, … (2019) The translational landscape of the human heart. Cell
6. Schafer S*, Viswanathan S*, Widjaja AA*, Lim W, Moreno-Moral A, DeLaughter DM, Ng B, et al. (2017) IL11 is a critical determinant of cardiovascular fibrosis. Nature
7. Heinig M*, Adriaens ME*, Schafer S*, van Deutekom HWM, Lodder EM, Ware JS, Schneider V, et al. (2017) Natural genetic variation of the cardiac transcriptome in non-diseased donors and patients with dilated cardiomyopathy. Genome Biology
8. Schafer S*, De Marvao A*, Adami E, Fiedler LR, Ng B, Khin E, Rackham OJ, et al. (2017) Titin-truncating variants affect heart function in disease cohorts and the general population. Nature Genetics
9. Hinson JT, Chopra A, Nafissi N, Polacheck WJ, Benson CC, … Schafer S, … (2015) Titin mutations in iPS cells define sarcomere insufficiency as a cause of dilated cardiomyopathy. Science
10. Schafer S*, Adami E*, Heinig M, Costa Rodrigues KE, Kreuchwig F, Silhavy J, van Heesch S, et al. (2015) Translational regulation shapes the molecular landscape of complex disease phenotypes. Nature Communications