DIRK ELEWAUT, MD, PhD
PROFESSOR OF RHEUMATOLOGY AND IMMUNOLOGY
VIB Center for Inflammation Research, Ghent University
CHAIR
Department of Rheumatology and Immunology, Ghent University Hospital
Ghent, Belgium
Prof. Dirk Elewaut is a Full Professor of Rheumatology and Immunology and Chair of the Department of Rheumatology and Immunology at Ghent University Hospital, Ghent, Belgium, a European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology (EULAR) and Federation of Clinical Immunology Societies (FOCIS) centre of excellence. He received his medical degree at Ghent University in 1991 and his PhD in 1997 at the same institution. Following his postdoctoral research at the University of California, San Diego and the La Jolla Institute for Allergy and Immunology, CA, USA, he joined the Faculty of the Department of Rheumatology at Ghent University Hospital in 2001.
He has published more than 350 scientific publications in leading scientific journals and is Principal Investigator of the Unit of Molecular Immunology and Inflammation of the VIB Center for Inflammation Research at Ghent University.
Currently, he serves as past Chair of the EULAR Research Center and as a member of the editorial boards of several leading rheumatology journals. Also, he is a member of the Royal Academy for Medical Sciences in Belgium.
Prof. Elewaut has received several awards including the 2020 Carol Nachman Award. His research interests are centred around translational aspects of immune regulation to combat inflammatory arthritis and associated joint damage, with a special focus on the link between Gout and Joint Disease in Spondyloarthritis.