Marilen Benner

291 13 CURRICULUM VITAE CURRICULUM VITAE Marilen grew up in Mettmann, Germany, where she attended the Konrad-Heresbach-Gymnasium. In 2008, she spent a semester at the Sunshine Beach State High school in Noosa, Australia. After graduating from secondary education in 2011, she moved to Nijmegen, The Netherlands, to study (Medical) Biology at the Radboud University. In her third year, she performed a research internship at the Laboratory of Experimental Nephrology under supervision of Prof. Dr. Johan van der Vlag in the context of the Radboud Honors Academy. She visited the Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem, Israel, for parts of this project. Finishing her bachelor’s program cum laude, she was selected to enroll in the research master’s program Molecular Mechanisms of Disease (MMD) of the Radboud university medical center (Radboudumc) and the Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences (RIMLS). She joined the field of reproductive immunology during her first master’s internship, under supervision of Dr. Renate van der Molen at the lab of Prof. Dr. Irma Joosten. She continued studying the unique immunological characteristics of the placenta at the Harvard Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology in Cambridge, USA, at the lab of Prof. Dr. Jack Strominger, under supervision of Dr. Tamara Tilburgs. Both her master’s theses obtained awards, as Best Thesis of the Radboudumc and the University Study Award 2016, respectively. Marilen finished her master’s program cum laude in 2016. Her PhD project proposal, written together with Prof. Dr. Joosten, Dr. Van der Molen, and Dr. Gerben Ferwerda, was awarded with a Junior Researcher grant, funding the work presented in this thesis. She started her PhD at the group of Dr. Van der Molen in November 2016. Marilen has presented her work at various international conferences, which was sponsored by several awarded travel grants. Marilen supervised bachelor’s and master’s students during their internships. Next to her research, she was an active member of the RIMLS PhD council, organizing events, and creating opportunities for PhD candidates to exchange their experiences. Marilen chaired the council for 1.5 years, representing RIMLS PhD candidates to improve the graduate school for fellow young researchers. Marilen lives together with Rindert in their house in Nijmegen Brakkenstein.