Hanns Lochmüller

Senior Scientist, CHEO Research Institute

Professor of Neurology, University of Ottawa Faculty of Medicine and The Ottawa Hospital Department of Medicine

Hanns is a neurologist and clinical academic specializing in genetic neuromuscular disorders and rare disease. He is Senior Scientist at the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) Research Institute. He also holds appointments as Professor of Neurology in the University of Ottawa Faculty of Medicine and the Department of Medicine, Division of Neurology at The Ottawa Hospital. He is affiliated with the University of Ottawa Brain and Mind Research Institute and Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine and with the Ottawa Centre for Neuromuscular Disease.

Hanns trained as a neurologist in Munich, Germany and in Montreal, Canada. From 2007 to 2017, he held the chair of experimental myology at the Institute of Genetic Medicine at Newcastle University in the UK. He continues to hold a scientific appointment at the Department of Neuropediatrics and Muscle Disorders of the Medical Center – University of Freiburg in Germany and as visiting scientist at the Centro Nacional de Análisis Genómico (CNAG), Centre for Genomic Regulation, Barcelona in Spain.

His research interests include molecular therapies of neuromuscular disorders; molecular pathogenesis of muscle and neuromuscular junction disorders; neurogenetics and translational research; data sharing and -omics in neuromuscular and rare diseases; and genomics and systems medicine. In addition to his scientific and clinical research interests, he is internationally active in rare disease science policy and research collaborations. He chaired the Interdisciplinary Scientific Committee of the International Rare Diseases Research Consortium (IRDiRC) and the Executive Committee of the TREAT-NMD Alliance. He initiated and coordinated the highly successful “RD-Connect” international infrastructure for rare disease data and biosample sharing and analysis, is co-founder and former coordinator of the German muscular dystrophy network (MD-NET), and former scientific coordinator of EuroBioBank, a European (and Canadian) network of biobanks for rare disorders.

Hanns’s clinical activities focus on clinical research and care of patients with rare neuromuscular disorders, including myotonic dystrophy (DM1), spinal muscular atrophy (SMA), muscular dystrophy and congenital myasthenic syndromes (CMS). He has a strong commitment to working with patients and patient organizations in Canada, as he has with organizations in Europe for many years.

Recent publications

Walter, MC, Laforêt, P, van der Pol, WL, Pegoraro, E, 254th ENMC Workshop Study Group. 254th ENMC international workshop. Formation of a European network to initiate a European data collection, along with development and sharing of treatment guidelines for adult SMA patients. Virtual meeting 28 - 30 January 2022. Neuromuscul Disord. 2023.33 (6)511-522 PMID:37245491

O'Connor, K, Spendiff, S, Lochmüller, H, Horvath, R. Mitochondrial Mutations Can Alter Neuromuscular Transmission in Congenital Myasthenic Syndrome and Mitochondrial Disease. Int J Mol Sci. 2023.24 (10) PMID:37239850

Pugliese, A, Holland, SH, Rodolico, C, Lochmüller, H, Spendiff, S. Presynaptic Congenital Myasthenic Syndromes: Understanding Clinical Phenotypes through In vivo Models. J Neuromuscul Dis. 2023. PMID:37212067

Roos, A, van der Ven, PFM, Alrohaif, H, Kölbel, H, Heil, L, Della Marina, A et al.. Bi-allelic variants of FILIP1 cause congenital myopathy, dysmorphism and neurological defects. Brain. 2023. PMID:37163662

Yaldiz, B, Kucuk, E, Hampstead, J, Hofste, T, Pfundt, R, Corominas Galbany, J et al.. Twist exome capture allows for lower average sequence coverage in clinical exome sequencing. Hum Genomics. 2023.17 (1)39 PMID:37138343

Smith, IC, Pileggi, CA, Wang, Y, Kernohan, K, Hartley, T, McMillan, HJ et al.. Novel Homozygous Variant in COQ7 in Siblings With Hereditary Motor Neuropathy. Neurol Genet. 2023.9 (1)e200048 PMID:37077559

Jackson, A, Lin, SJ, Jones, EA, Chandler, KE, Orr, D, Moss, C et al.. Clinical, genetic, epidemiologic, evolutionary, and functional delineation of TSPEAR-related autosomal recessive ectodermal dysplasia 14. HGG Adv. 2023.4 (2)100186 PMID:37009414

Lecca, M, Pehlivan, D, Suñer, DH, Weiss, K, Coste, T, Zweier, M et al.. Bi-allelic variants in the ESAM tight-junction gene cause a neurodevelopmental disorder associated with fetal intracranial hemorrhage. Am J Hum Genet. 2023.110 (4)681-690 PMID:36996813

Hentschel, A, Meyer, N, Kohlschmidt, N, Groß, C, Sickmann, A, Schara-Schmidt, U et al.. Correction: A Homozygous PPP1R21 Splice Variant Associated with Severe Developmental Delay, Absence of Speech, and Muscle Weakness Leads to Activated Proteasome Function. Mol Neurobiol. 2023.60 (7)4164 PMID:36941504

Nguyen, CDL, Jimenez-Moreno, AC, Merker, M, Bowers, CJ, Nikolenko, N, Hentschel, A et al.. Periostin as a blood biomarker of muscle cell fibrosis, cardiomyopathy and disease severity in myotonic dystrophy type 1. J Neurol. 2023.270 (6)3138-3158 PMID:36892629

McMacken, G, Whittaker, RG, Wake, R, Lochmuller, H, Horvath, R. Neuromuscular junction involvement in inherited motor neuropathies: genetic heterogeneity and effect of oral salbutamol treatment. J Neurol. 2023.270 (6)3112-3119 PMID:36869887

See more on PubMed

Lochmüller Lab

Hanns Lochmüller and team: research and clinical activities