Valerie Rose Wiersma

I am a senior postdoctoral researcher at the department of Hematology of the University Medical Center Groningen (UMCG, since 2017) that believes that the sugar decoration of cells, the so-called glycosylation, harbors many yet still unexplored avenues for cancer (immune) therapy. My current research line 'GlycoHematology' therefore focusses on cancer glycobiology and its impact on among others chemosensitivity and immunotherapy, with a special focus on CAR T cell therapy. For this research, I was awarded a ZonMW 'off-road' grant in 2023 to study the impact of blood glycose levels on CAR T cell glycosylation and activity. I was a postdoctoral fellow of the Dutch Cancer Foundation (KWF, 2017-2022), as I was awarded a Young investigator grant to study the cytotoxic potential of the glycan-binding protein Galectin-9 towards acute myeloid leukemia. Furthermore, I am involved in the European ITN consortia I-DireCT and InnoCAR-T as supervisor/ co-promotor of the participating students and as training coordinator. During my PhD studies I worked on the anticancer activity of Galectin-9 and the cytotoxic molecule TRAIL at the surgical department of the UMCG (2010-2014). This was followed by a postdoc position at the department of Obstetrics and Gynecology of the UMCG (2014-2016) where I worked on a project that aimed to re-activate tumor infiltrating lymphocytes in ovarian carcinoma. Before I started my PhD-project, I did a master in ‘Medical Pharmaceutical sciences’ at the University of Groningen (2008-2010) and a bachelor in ‘Biotechnology’ at the van Hall Institute in Leeuwarden (2004-2008). For additional information regarding my publications and research please visit: ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8012-0376 Frontiers loops : https://loop.frontiersin.org/people/197570/overview University of Groningen: https://www.rug.nl/staff/v.r.wiersma/research