Andrea Benediktsdottir receiver of STINT International Postdoc scholarship

Andrea Benediktsdottir, PhD student at the Faculty of Pharmacy, is the receiver of a SEK 1.1 million scholarship from The Swedish Foundation for International Cooperation in Research and Higher Education, STINT, within their International Postdoc program: An initiative providing young researchers who have recently obtained their doctorates the opportunity to stay at a university in a country outside the EU /EFTA.

“My dissertation is scheduled for May 2024, after which I will enter a postdoc position at The Wright Lab at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada. I first came into contact with Dr. Gerry Wright at the Interdisciplinary Course on Antibiotics and Resistance, ICARe, in France, and that STINT is now giving me the opportunity to join Dr. Wright's team, which is undoubtedly one of the world's finest environments for antibiotic research, is something I am extremely grateful for.

Andrea Benediktsdottir is currently completing her doctoral project at Uppsala University. Here, she has synthesized a molecule with the capacity to attack gram-negative bacteria and which has so far not caused any undesired side effects. Benediktsdottir’s work is following a parallel track to a project at the international antibiotic platform ENABLE-2 and is attributed good prospects to generate important contributions in the global search for new antibiotics.

“At ICARe, I also got the inspiration to a concept where the molecule, by binding to iron, can lure the bacteria into opening their protective capsule, which is one of the big challenges in our field. So far I only have early results to lean on, but if we are succesful, the potential will be huge.”

As a postdoc at The Wright Lab, Andrea Benediktsdottir will study semisynthesis, a technique to use bacteria in order to develop new molecules. Along the way, she hopes to tailor a molecule that, upon her return to Sweden, can form a fundamental building block in Benediktsdottir's next goal: a method to disarm the infecting abilities of dangerous bacteria without affecting all the beneficial bacteria.

“Hopefully a lot of exciting research awaits in the future, but I am currently focused on my upcoming dissertation followed by two very valuable years at The Wright Lab. The fact that I also recently received notice from the Swedish Pharmaceutical Society that they are granting me a supplementary scholarship for my second year in Canada gives me the conditions to devote myself fully to my work, and it is fantastic to see how much Sweden invests in giving its young researchers the opportunity to compete on an international level.

LEARN MORE

• Research in Drug Design and Discovery
• The Wight Lab online
• STINT International Postdoc
• Swedish Pharmaceutical Society scholarships

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Text: Magnus Alsne, photo: Mikael Wallerstedt