Eduard Gallardo is a senior researcher at the Research Institute of the Hospital Santa Creu i Sant Pau (HSCSP) in Barcelona, ​​where he joined in 1993 and where he did his doctoral thesis under the direction of Prof. Isabel ILLA. He is the supervisor of the Neuromuscular Diseases Laboratory of the IRHSCSP and coordinator of the Consolidated Research Group of the Generalitat and of CIBERER U762.

He has oriented his research work on the autoimmune and neurodegenerative aspects of neuromuscular diseases. Focused on the search for new antigens (biomarkers), immunopathogenic mechanisms and the development of new therapeutic strategies in myasthenia gravis and inflammatory myopathies, he has also investigated the function of proteins, dysferlin and others, involved in the pathogenesis of muscular dystrophies and their treatment.

He has developed a series of diagnostic techniques, immunological tests and muscle biopsy studies that are very useful in the diagnosis of various NMDs and a benchmark both nationally and internationally. One of the diagnostic tests for the analysis of dysferlin expression in peripheral blood monocytes has given rise to a patent of which he is co-inventor and which is exploited by Athena Diagnostics.

He has been a Fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Dalakas of the National Institutes of Health (1994) where he worked on the immunopathogenic mechanisms of inflammatory myopathies and Research Scholar in the Day Lab of Dr RH Brown at Mass Gral Hospital, Harvard University (2006) where he worked on myopathy due to dysferlin deficiency, and specifically in the development of a muscle cell membrane lesion test for drug screening. He has been a panelist for the ISCIII-FIS Neurology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience Research Projects Area, a reviewer of projects (FIS, AFM, Junta de Andalucía, Basque Government) and of articles for various scientific journals (Neurology, Neuromuscular Disorders, PlosOne, BBA – Molecular Basis of Disease, Acta Neuropathologica, Brain, European J of Neurology, Frontiers in Neurology, Neurology, Neuroimmunology and Inflammation,…).

He is the author of more than 130 scientific articles and has received continuous funding from the FIS since 1999, among other funding sources. He has directed 8 doctoral theses and is currently directing three.

Academic training:

• Degree in Biology from the University of Barcelona 1990
• Doctor of Medicine and Surgery from the Autonomous University of Barcelona 2002. Thesis: «Immunopathogenic aspects of inflammatory myopathies». Extraordinary doctorate award UAB. Director: Prof Isabel Illa

Research projects:

• Health Research Fund (FIS) (Spain)
• Isabel Gemio Foundation
• Industry Agreements: Ahead Therapeutics, Sanofi

Research Areas:

• Identification of new biomarkers for the diagnosis and prognosis of ENM
• Physiopathogenic study of myasthenia and inflammatory myopathies
• Pathogenesis of hereditary myopathies