Sean is from the North West of England, UK, and obtained his BSc in Biochemistry in 2008 from the University of Manchester. For his PhD thesis at the Genome Damage and Stability Centre (University of Sussex, UK), obtained in 2013, Sean studied the then novel DNA primase-polymerase PrimPol, establishing a role for this enzyme in DNA damage tolerance in both human cells and the African trypanosome. For his postdoctoral studies, funded by an EMBO Long-Term Fellowship, Sean came to Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, to investigate the role of nucleotide modifications upon genome stability in cancer. In 2019, Sean became an Assistant Professor at the Department of Oncology-Pathology in Karolinska Institutet, and established his research team at SciLifeLab, where he is now a Group Leader.

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Si Min obtained her B.Sc degree from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She subsequently earned a dual Ph.D. degree from both Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (Professor James P. Tam group) and Karolinska Institutet, Sweden (Professor Anders Vahlne group). During her doctoral training, her research focused on the development of peptidyl antiviral drugs targeting HIV-1 and SARS-CoV. Driven by an interest in translational antiviral research, Si Min joined Lion TCR Ltd., Singapore, and the team of Professor Antonio Bertoletti at Duke-NUS Medical School. There, she contributed to the implementation of a Phase I/II clinical trial investigating autologous T-cell receptor therapy for the treatment of hepatitis virus–associated liver cancer. She continued her focus on personalized medicine during her postdoctoral training at Karolinska Institutet with Professor Thomas Helleday, where she identified the host enzyme NUDT15 as a key therapeutic target and biomarker for improving chemotherapy outcomes. Her subsequent postdoctoral work with Dr. Sean Rudd further advanced the development of small-molecule inhibitors targeting the chemotherapy resistance factor SAMHD1.

Currently, Si Min is a Research Specialist (Forskningsspecialist) in the Rudd group at Karolinska Institutet, where she is developing and leading an independent research program aimed at identifying and exploiting host nucleotide metabolism for personalized antiviral therapy. Her research is supported by funding from the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet), Åke Wibergs Stiftelse, Stiftelsen Clas Groschinskys Minnesfond, etc.

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Femke obtained her BSc and MSc degree in Biomedical Sciences at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, focussing on metabolic intervention in phenylketonuria and determining efficacy of antibody drug conjugates in breast cancer models. After developing an interest in cancer, she joined the group of Professor Monique den Boer at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam to study the role of chromosome 21 in pediatric B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia. After 9 months, the den Boer group joined the newly established Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology in Utrecht, where Femke continued her PhD research. Here, she studied the frequency of targetable genetic lesions in chromosome 21 altered leukemia with specific focus on the poor prognostic iAMP21 subtype. In addition, she established several chromosome 21 altered models for further studies into the role of chromosome 21 related leukemia and identified the good-prognostic NUTM1-rearranged subtype in pediatric and infant leukemia. While finishing her PhD thesis, Femke joined the Rudd Lab for her postdoctoral research to study the mechanism of action of antimetabolites in the treatment of (pediatric) T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, and is funded by a postdoctoral fellowship from Cancerfonden and a Junior Research Grant from the European Hematology Association.

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Radosveta obtained a BSc and MSc in Biomedicine from Karolinska Institutet. She pursued her interest in redox biochemistry by completing a PhD under Prof. Elias Arnér at Karolinska Institutet, where she focused on characterizing the molecular mechanisms of action of novel thioredoxin reductase inhibitors. Her projects have straddled enzyme biochemistry and small molecule development. She has a broad expertise in redox biology, specialized knowledge in selenoproteins and a keen interest in diving deeper into translational cancer biology. As a postdoctoral researcher at the Rudd laboratory, she looks forward to approaching drug development projects from a different perspective and further our understanding of the mechanisms of action of standard of care anti-metabolite drugs in childhood leukemias. She is a part of the KI-SciLifeLab Clinical Translational Postdoc Network and will divide her time between the Rudd laboratory and the group of Nikolas Herold (Department of Women and Children’s Health, Karolinska Institutet)

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Christopher studied Molecular Life Science at the University of Lübeck, Germany, where he obtained his MSc in 2021. After delving into many different areas of research during his studies he decided to pursue the topics of cancer biology and nucleotide metabolism as a PhD student in the Rudd Lab. The focus of his work will be to improve the understanding of (and trying to exploit) the dNTPase SAMHD1 in the context of cancer, partially funded by a Karolinska Institutet KID grant.

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Ann-Kathrin obtained her BSc in Molecular Biology at the University of Mainz, Germany, before completing her MSc in Biomedicine at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm. During her studies, she developed an interest in genomic stability, RNA-protein interactions and the DNA damage response. Motivated by how these processes can be exploited therapeutically, Ann-Kathrin joined the Rudd Lab as a PhD student. Her research focuses on elucidating the mechanism of action of the anti-leukemic nucleoside analogue nelarabine, with the goal of improving the current understanding of its activity and informing more effective treatment strategies.

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Andreas earned his BSc in Biology and Medical Laboratory Research from Hanze University of Applied Sciences in Groningen, The Netherlands. He began his career as a medical analyst in the Department of Hematology at the University Hospital of Groningen, where he performed diagnostic tests for patients with hematological malignancies. This experience deepened his interest in the pathogenesis of leukemia and motivated him to pursue an MSc in Biomedical Sciences at the University of Groningen, which he completed in 2024. In 2025, Andreas joined the Rudd lab as a research assistant, contributing to ongoing projects aimed at improving our understanding of the biological mechanisms underlying chemotherapeutic treatments for leukemia.

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