!!Taina Pihlajaniemi - Curriculum Vitae
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__Research expertise:__ Internationally leading expert on collagens \\
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__Education and degrees completed:__
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*1987 Docent in Medical Biochemistry, Univ. of Oulu, Finland    \\
*1987 Doctor of Medical Sciences (equivalent to Ph.D.), Univ. of Oulu   \\
*1981 Licentiate of Medicine, Univ. of Oulu, and license to practice medicine
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__Current and previous positions:__
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*2010-2025, Vice Rector/Vice President (Research), Univ. of Oulu \\
*1991-2009 Chairman, Depart. of Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Univ. of Oulu    \\
*1990- Professor of Medical Biochemistry, Univ. of Oulu  \\
*1985-1990 Research Associate and Junior Research Fellow, Academy of Finland (AoF)   \\
*1982-1985 Research/Teaching Specialist III (post-doctoral fellow), University of Medicine and Dentistry - Rutgers Medical School, Piscataway, New Jersey, USA 
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__Research supervision:__  \\
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Supervised 47 PhD or MD-PhD degrees to completion and 28 post-doctoral scientists   \\
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__Previous leadership experience:__
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*2000 - 2005 (Vice) Director, Collagen Research Unit, Univ. of Oulu, AoF Center of Excellence in Research  \\
*1996 - 2009 Scientific Director, Biocenter Oulu and the core facilites  \\
*1996 - 2009 Director, Biocenter Oulu Graduate School  \\
*2006 - 2007 Founding Director, Biocenter Finland  \\
*2012 - 2017 Director, AoF Center of Excellence in Cell-Extracellular Matrix Research
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__Teaching experience:__ \\
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1990-2009 Head of medical and dental studies in chemistry, medical biochemistry and molecular biology, Faculty of Medicine, Univ. of Oulu   \\
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__Evaluation of academic competence and search committee memberships:__ 
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*Pre-examiner, Doctoral Dissertations (7 times), Univ. of Helsinki and Turku  \\
*Opponent, Doctoral Dissertations (6 times), Univ. of Oulu, Turku, Rennes, Uppsala  \\
*Evaluator, Docentships (8 times), Univ. of Turku and Helsinki  \\
*Evaluator, Professorships (3 times), Univ. of Kuopio, Turku and Helsinki
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__Keynote and speaker invitations:__ ca. 3-4/year   \\
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__Experience of organizing scientific meetings:__ 
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*2006, Chair, the XXth Meeting of the Federation of European Connective Tissue Societies, Oulu, Finland  \\
*2009, Chair, Mouse as a Model Organism Conference, Rovaniemi, Finland  \\
*2019, 2023, Vice chair in 2019 and Chair in 2021 (re-scheduled to 2023 due to COVID-19 pandemic) of the Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on Collagen, New London, USA\\ \\