I pursued my Bachelor’s and Master’s studies in Biochemistry at the University of Tuebingen. During my Bachelor studies I received a scholarship for a semester abroad at the Capital Normal University, Beijing, China and Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. As part of my Masters studies I got the opportunity to perform a number of different internships. During my internship in Prof Killian Hurley’s group, my interest for induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) models was awakened. After my finishing my Master thesis entitled “Biophysical properties of human iPSC-derived vascular smooth muscle cells in health and disease” with Prof Sanjay Sinha at the University of Cambridge UK I returned to Dublin to start my PhD with Prof Killian Hurley. My PhD thesis is entitled “Biological sex drives pro-fibrotic differences in type II alveolar epithelial cells from patients with monogenic pulmonary fibrosis”.

My main research interest is to better understand the pathogenesis of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) and in particular the role of biological sex by using a novel iPSC-derived type II alveolar epithelial cell model. This will lay the groundwork to identifying novel drug targets and ultimately finding new therapeutics for patients affected by IPF.

Email: anjaschweikert21@rcsi.ie