I am a PhD candidate at the University Medical Centre Groningen (UMCG) under the supervision of prof. dr. Harm Kampinga and dr. Mark Hipp and. I did a bachelor’s degree in Bio-Pharmaceutical Sciences at Leiden University. In 2023, I completed the research master Behavioral and Cognitive Neurosciences at Groningen University, specializing in Molecular and Clinical Neuroscience. During my master’s, my first research internship focused on phase separation of FG-Nups within the group led by prof. dr. Liesbeth Veenhoff at the European Institute for the Biology of Ageing (ERIBA) in Groningen. For my second research internship, I had the opportunity to work with dr. Charlène Boumendil at the Institute for Human Genetics (IGH) in Montpellier, France. Here, I studied the role of heterochromatin exclusion at nuclear pores in nucleocytoplasmic transport. My interest in molecular and cellular neuroscience research and its translation into clinical practice motivated me to start a PhD project within the CureQ consortium.

My project, part of WP4, focuses on developing highly sensitive reporters to detect the collapse of protein homeostasis in polyQ diseases. These reporters will help to better register disease modulators and will be employed to determine parameters of the disease landscapes. The long-term goal is to discover endogenous proteins as early biomarkers for disease onset.