Cristina Al-Khalili Szigyarto

Cristina Al-Khalili Szigyarto has a broad background in the field of biochemistry, biotechnology and bioinformatics and is mainly interested in multidisciplinary research topics.  She received her Ph.D. at the Department of Biochemistry, Stockholm University in 2001 with specialization in characterization of proteolytic events in cells. The same year she was awarded with the Swedish Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowship to pursue a postdoctoral training at the Department of Biochemistry, Amsterdam University. There she received training in the field of DNA microarrays with emphasis on transcriptomic analysis. In 2004 she obtained a position as group leader for the Antigen design module within the Human Protein Atlas program working with bioinformatics and antibody-based proteomics. Since 2007 Cristina is working as scientific coordinator within the Human Protein Atlas. She is currently working mainly in the field of antibody-based proteomics and involved in 4 EU-FP7 projects PRIMES, AFFINOMICS, CAGEKID and EURATRANS.  During the past 5 years I have focused on development of biomarkers for rare disorders using both transcriptomics and proteomics methods. My goal is to use developed tools, knowledge and expertise to aid translation of research results to clinical practice in particular discovery and validation of biomarkers. Recently, a new initiative to identify Biomarker Signatures for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy has been initiated with funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH)