Sahar Masoumeh Ghorbanpour ESA-SRB-APEG-NZSE 2022

Sahar Masoumeh Ghorbanpour

I am currently undertaking my PhD under the supervision of Dr. Lana McClements at the Faculty of Science, University of Technology Sydney (UTS). I hold a Master’s degree in Biotechnology from the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences (BOKU) in Vienna, which was centered around the project on production of enzymes engineered for recycling of plastics. Prior to embarking on my PhD, I worked full-time as a Research Assistant at the Austrian Centre of Industrial Biotechnology (ACIB); an esteemed European organization known for developing environmentally-friendly and economically viable practices for the biotechnological and pharmaceutical industries. During my time at ACIB, I published two research articles in the field of vaccine technology. As my passion and interests developed around using cutting-edge technology for establishing sustainable methods in medical research, a primary objective of my doctoral study is to develop 3D microfluidic vascularized human-disease models focusing on cardiovascular diseases including preeclampsia and peripheral artery disease. While animal models have been extensively used in pre-clinical studies, translation to humans has been challenging due to variability and unpredictability of disease manifestation in animal models. Therefore, my research involves generations of new 3D models based on human cells to recapitulate human vascular tissue microenvironments in real-time.