Andra Dumitru is a La Caixa Junior Leader at the Spanish National Center for Cardiovascular Research (CNIC), where she is pursuing her goal of becoming an independent researcher. Andra is currently developing her own research line centered on studying the mechanical regulation of nuclear proteins in pathogenic conditions in the group of Jorge Alegre Cebollada at CNIC. Her aim is to address biomedical problems relevant for the society, such as diabetes mellitus, cancer or ageing with a cross-disciplinary approach that combines state-of-the-art nano-biophysics with single-molecule techniques, protein biochemistry and animal models.
Recent AFM-related papers:
Biography: Andra obtained her bachelor degree in Chemical Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Bucharest, followed by a master of Organic Chemistry from Complutense University of Madrid in 2012. Upon completing her master studies, Andra changed gears from the chemistry field and started her Ph.D. in Physics under the supervision of Prof. Ricardo Garcia at the Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid (CSIC) with a JAE PreDoc fellowship. During her PhD she developed atomic force microscopy methods for non-ideal systems found in many biomedical applications. As a chemist, she was drawn towards multidisciplinary approaches, so she expanded her knowledge in biophysics and surface chemistry within the AFM field.
After her PhD, Andra joined the nano-biophysics group of Prof. David Alsteens at the Catholic University of Louvain, in Belgium, funded by several Belgian postdoctoral fellowships like MoveIN Louvain co-funded by Marie Curie Actions and FNRS-Charge de Recherche. As a postdoc, Andra focused on combining high-resolution atomic force microscopy and live cell confocal imaging to study mechanical and biophysical properties of single molecules and cells.
She moved back to Spain in 2021 funded by a Juan de la Cierva Incorporacion fellowship and joined the Molecular Mechanics of the Cardiovascular System Group led by Dr. Jorge Alegre Cebollada at CNIC in Madrid. While working with Dr. Jorge Alegre, she is awarded several competitive and prestigious postdoctoral fellowships, like Marie Curie Individual Fellowship, a tenure-track Ramon y Cajal grant and La Caixa Junior Leader.
Twitter: @andra_dumitru
Are you a woman conducting AFM research or know of someone you would like to nominate to be featured in our next #WomenInAFM campaign? Contact us at community@nunano.com!
Also, check out our previous March and November 2021 Women in AFM blog posts to read about more researchers.
Why are we celebrating women in AFM? (March 2021)
Why do we need to highlight women in AFM? (Nov 2021)