PhD in Tumor Immunology at Erasmus MC Rotterdam

I started my PhD project at the Erasmus MC in Rotterdam in February 2018. An exciting opportunity where I had the chance to work on a collaboration project between two departments. Unfortunately, I decided to quit due to an internal reorganisation in which my supervisor had to leave the work floor.

Although this was not what I had hoped for when I started this trajectory I am very proud of myself. Sometimes you have to choose what is best for you and I truly believe that not succeeding at something is not the same thing as failure. I have learned so much during these one-and-a-half years and this experience has made me even more determined that I want to continue in research.

My research was focused on the molecular characteristics of prostate cancer and how this relates to the composition of the tumor micro-environment. I spend quite a few hours on my flow-sorting skills, managed to learn the basics of programming in R and I had some great presentations at bigger and smaller meetings.

My first oral presentation was at the Molecular Medicine Research Day 2019 in Rotterdam. This was quickly followed by a short "laptop presentation" at the Dutch Tumor Immunology Meeting and an oral presentation in the beautiful city of Porto at the ESUR19 conference. Many of my colleagues would agree that public speaking is truly my strong suit and that I have this crazy infectious enthusiasm about sharing my research.

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