Astra Activities 2026-2028
Grantee: Mikkel Bohm, Astra
Amount: DKK 15,000,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2026
Geography: Denmark
Astra is Denmark’s national STEM education center. The grant supports continuation and new developments for three core activities:
- Unge Forskere (“Young Scientists”): An annual science talent competition in which students of all age groups can pursue a project, often as an integrated part of their STEM classes.
- Science Talenter (“Science Talents”): Camps, classes, and conferences within STEM topics, anchored at Astra’s facilities in Sorø and aimed at talented pupils from Danish schools.
- Big Bang: An annual conference for STEM education professionals to gain new ideas and meet inspiring colleagues.
SIC Skin Immunology and Barrier Research in Sub-Saharan Africa
Grantee: Jonathan Coquet, University of Copenhagen, LEO Foundation Skin Immunology Research Center
Amount: DKK 13,504,945
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2026
Geography: Denmark
This grant will enable the LEO Foundation Skin Immunology Research Center to initiate long-term relations with universities and research institutions in Tanzania and South Africa through five complementary collaborative research projects:
- Allergic Contact Dermatitis in Tanzania
- Hand Dermatitis and Quality of Life in South Africa
- Immune Profiling and Allergen Sensitivity in Tanzanian Populations
- Clinical and Immunological Insights into Pityriasis Versicolor
- Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma (CTCL) and Skin Microbiome in Tanzania
The grant and the projects will further support the center’s mission to be an international center of excellence for barrier tissue immunology research.
Innovation District Copenhagen
Grantee: Innovation District Copenhagen
Amount: DKK 10,000,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2025
Geography: Denmark
Innovation District Copenhagen (IDC) is a newly established association aimed at building a strong international innovation environment in Copenhagen. The initiative brings together research, education, and industry with a shared focus on translating knowledge into solutions that create societal value.
Dermatology Research Across Multiple Disciplines (DREAM)
Grantee: Aarhus University and Aarhus University Hospital
Amount: DKK 11,989,450
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2025
Geography: Denmark
The goal of DREAM (Dermatology Research Across Multiple Disciplines) is to unravel the complex mechanisms linking chronic inflammatory and autoimmune skin diseases to systemic complications. By identifying key factors that predict disease progression and multi-organ involvement, the aim is to enhance our ability to forecast individual disease trajectories.
The overall vision of DREAM is to uncover and solve leading research questions in dermatological and associated diseases using a systems medicine approach.
Novel methods and technologies: Spatial transcriptomics, wildlings and 3D skin models
Grantee: University of Copenhagen
Amount: DKK 18,908,400
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2025
Geography: Denmark
Through this grant the LEO Foundation Skin Immunology Research Center is expanding its scientific and technological capabilities by incorporating three new areas of expertise:
- Spatial transcriptomics (in collaboration with the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR))
- Establishment of an animal facility for “wildlings” – a special type of laboratory mice that contain a – controlled – level of microorganisms which make them more akin to real-world animals and provides a more natural model, in particular for interactions with and responses from the immune system.
- Establishment of advanced 3D skin models for experiments building on genetic manipulation of specific cell types from the skin.
Each area is carefully selected to strengthen the center’s focus on performing frontier research within barrier immunology.
Super-krop!
Grantee: Experimentarium Science Center, Kim Gladstone Herlev, CEO of Experimentarium
Amount: DKK 9,000,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2024
Geography: Denmark
The science center Experimentarium in Copenhagen will open a major exhibition about the human body in 2026. The exhibition is called Super-krop!, which means Super body, and aims to illustrate the interaction between the body and behavior, targeting a younger audience.
Super-krop! is supported by the LEO Foundation alongside the Novo Nordisk Foundation, the Lundbeck Foundation, and Ole Kirk’s Foundation with a total of DKK 30 million.
Hand Eczema in the Fishing Industry in Greenland
Grantee: Kristina Ibler, Bispebjerg Hospital, Dronning Ingrid’s Health Center, the Greenland Fishing Industry, Greenland University, and University of Copenhagen
Amount: DKK 3,437,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2024
Geography: Denmark
The overall vision with this research project is to improve skin health and the quality of prevention and treatment of skin diseases in Greenland and the Arctic societies in general. Around 25% of all inquiries to the health care system in Greenland relate to skin diseases. Arctic indigenous peoples have their own genetic variation and have for centuries adapted to their unique geographical environments and culture. Consequently, medical treatment regimens from other countries most often cannot be directly transferred and used in the Greenlandic health care setting. New knowledge, competences and technologies are warranted for utilization across both prevention, translational and clinical research, and practice.
20% of the Greenlandic population is employed in the fishing industry which stands for 90% of Greenland’s export, making it a critical element in a sustainable community. It is expected that around 30-50% of the employees suffer from hand eczema, often with complicating secondary bacterial infection. As such, contact dermatitis has a significant negative impact on both quality of life and productivity in Greenland. The research project aims to provide some of the missing research data on skin diseases in Greenland. It will investigate the prevalence of contact dermatitis, risk factors, biomarkers, and genetic factors associated with contact dermatitis in the seafood-processing fishing industry, as well as explore the presence of bacterial strains and how they relate to dermatitis.
The LEO Foundation 40th Anniversary Prize
Grantee: Gregor Jemec, Professor of Dermatology and Head of Research at Zealand University Hospital
Amount: DKK 5,000,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2024
Geography: Denmark
Gregor Jemec is Professor of Dermatology and Head of Research at Zealand University Hospital.
He receives the LEO Foundation 40th Anniversary Prize for his extraordinary contribution to skin research – especially for his pioneering and persistent work with the chronic skin disease hidradenitis suppurativa (HS).
Gregor Jemec has been researching the skin and its diseases for the past 30 years and is one of Denmark’s most cited skin researchers. He is the author of over 800 publications and one of the world’s leading experts on HS, a skin condition that causes painful boils. Research estimates that one to four percent of the world’s population suffers from HS.
Center for Pharmaceutical Data Science Education
Grantee: The University of Copenhagen and the University of Southern Denmark
Amount: DKK 30,000,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2024
Geography: Denmark
Center for Pharmaceutical Data Science Education is funded by the LEO Foundation, the Novo Nordisk Foundation and the Lundbeck Foundation with a total of DKK 123 million over a six-year period.
The new center merges two fields of study – the pharmaceutical sciences and data science – and will ensure the students’ qualifications in data science by upgrading relevant compulsory bachelor’s and master’s courses. Artificial intelligence, machine learning and the use of big data open a huge area of knowledge, new data sources and methods, which should be integrated in the best possible way in the pharmaceutical sciences education.
4th annual International Conference on the Science of Science and Innovation (ICSSI)
Grantee: Dashun Wang, Professor, Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
Amount: DKK 500,000
Grant category: Standalone grants
Year: 2024
Geography: USA
This interdisciplinary event will convene leading experts in the field of science of science and innovation, aiming to provide a multi-channel platform that brings together both producers (scientists from industry and academia) and consumers (policymakers, publishers, funders, administrators, etc.) of the field.