Contestants Breaking Science 2026
A total of 30 candidates are taking part in Breaking Science 2026, all doing research at different faculties of Utrecht University. Let's get to know them (from A to Z):
Photos: Bas van Breukelen
Andriy Melnyk
Andriy is a Ukrainian-born Medical Doctor from Italy, with a specialisation in Public Health. After joining a startup competition in med school with some friends, his passion was ignited: I want to improve healthcare with all the amazing technology humanity is developing, for a bright and healthy future for all.
Anisudh Vinayale Kulkamni
Anisudh's academic work involves sugars. Before coming to The Netherlands for his Doctorate, he did his Master’s in Sweden (M.Sc. in Biotechnology) and Bachelors In India (B.Tech in Chemical Engineering).
Boudewijn van Binsbergen
Boudewijn is a PhD candidate at the Department of Plastic Surgery of the Wilhelmina Children’s Hospital. The overall aim of his research is to understand, detect, and predict upper extremity disorders in children with Mucopolysaccharidosis type I. To achieve this, they combine clinical, functional, and biomarker data, in order to develop evidence-based tools that help preserve hand function and quality of life.
Camila Barragan Ibanez
Camila is a PhD candidate in Methodology and Statistics at the Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences. Her research focuses on developing freely available tools to determine the number of individuals and groups that are required for cluster randomised trials, an experimental design. Throughout her studies, she realised how important is to be rigorous in research to ensure valid conclusions and, ultimately, producing a good impact in individuals’ life and in society.
Chantal Voskamp
Chantal is a postdoctoral researcher at the faculty of Veterinary Medicine and studies how cells communicate to repair and regenerate tissues. In her research she takes inspiration from natural cell messengers, called extracellular vesicles, to uncover which biomolecules drive tissue regeneration. She aims to translate these insights into therapies for both human and veterinary patients with musculoskeletal diseases.
Chusi Xie
Chusi is a fourth-year PhD candidate in Clinical Psychology. Her research focuses on using AI and machine learning to assess and understand predictors of mental disorders, particularly Prolonged Grief Disorder. Originally from southern China, she completed her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Canton, Macau, and Sweden, and is now conducting her research in the Netherlands.
Clarize de Korne
Clarize de Korne is a Postdoctoral researcher in Infectious Disease Epidemiology at the Julius Center, UMC Utrecht. She develops data-driven methods to support infectious disease prevention and control. Her current work focuses on using school absenteeism data as a proxy for infectious diseases in school-aged children.
Elena Radul
Elena is a third-year PhD student at the Department of Cell Biology, Neurobiology, and Biophysics at Utrecht University. Originally from Moldova, she earned her BSc at the University of Bologna before moving to Utrecht for her Master’s. She is fascinated by the dynamic world of microtubules - the cell’s structural highways - and therefore she explore how these tiny filaments shape cellular life.
Eveline Kallenberg
Eveline is a third-year PhD candidate researching student wellbeing. She focuses on identifying factors that enhance or hinder students’ wellbeing and explores how wellbeing can be embedded within educational curricula. With a background in Neuroscience, she combines scientific rigour with personal passion, prioritising her own wellbeing through dedicated CrossFit training and restorative beach walks.
Gyöngyi Macias Honti
Gyöngyi is a Mexican-Hungarian that has settled in the Netherlands. Gyöngyi did her BSc in Biotechnology Engineering and Molecular Biology at Tec de Monterrey, México and afterwards she obtained a MSc degree from KAUST, Saudi Arabia.
Joana Dopp
Joana is a postdoctoral scientist at Utrecht University, investigating the molecular mechanisms of behaviour-manipulation in a fungal parasite – ant host interaction. In her doctoral work in Belgium, she explored how sleep and circadian behaviours are regulated in fruit fly brains. Before her PhD, she did research on synaptic plasticity mechanisms in London.
Julia Vreugdenhil
Julia is interested in developing analytical methods to learn which human milk oligosaccharide (HMO) isomers are naturally produced and to explore the functions they have in infant development. Her previous work experience provided her with a thorough experience in HPLC, which enables her to achieve the best possible separations for her HMOs. After work, Julia likes dancing, body pump, and being in nature.
Katharina Sybille Kreuer
Katharina Sybille Kreuer, from Germany, studied psychology and behavior science in Nijmegen. Before she started her PhD in May 2025, she was working in e-commerce and then in market research in Hamburg. Now she am investigating the field of consumer technostress.
Lisanne Laagland
She was trained as a veterinarian and then immediately started her PhD at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine in the Regenerative Orthopedics group led by Prof. Tryfonidou. Her PhD focused on developing a regenerative treatment for low back pain in dogs and humans, a topic she continued to work on during her postdoc.
Lisanne van den Berg
Lisanne is a PhD candidate at UU who studies how people in NGOs can strengthen their well-being from the inside out. Her work shows how inner resources, like resilience, optimism and self-efficacy, help employees stay grounded and effective in demanding environments. She values multidisciplinary research that makes a real difference in practice and is also affiliated with the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. She holds an MSc in Sociology from the University of Oxford.
Liza Kulaeva
Liza is a third-year PhD student in computational biology and a self-declared genomic data detective building personalized genome references to identify cancer-associated mutations more accurately. She is driven by helping patients through untangling complex bioinformatics pipelines. Before starting her PhD, she completed her BSc and MSc in biology at Southern Federal University, Russia.
Mădălina Zgreabăn
Mădălina Zgreabăn is a second-year PhD student at Utrecht University studying the generalizability and explainability of LLMs. With degrees in linguistics & literature from Utrecht University and the University of Bucharest, her research interests have spanned artificial intelligence and linguistics, particularly language and vision models, human alignment, formal semantics, humor, leadership, and outreach initiatives.
Michelle Robers
Michelle is a PhD student in molecular biology investigating how the organization of the genome influences gene regulation. Her work focuses on lamina-associated domains and how genome positioning inside the nucleus shapes chromatin organization and gene activity.
Olaf Massen
After a bachelor in chemistry and physics and a master in both experimental and theoretical physics Olaf is currently working as a PhD candidate at the GRASP institute for Gravitational and Subatomic Physics. His research focusses on the interplay between experimental and theoretical physics, where he focuses on heavy ion collisions at extremely high energies.
Rosalba Piramide
Rosalba is a second-year PhD candidate at Utrecht University in the Chemical Biology and Drug Discovery group as part of a Marie Skłodowska-Curie project. Originally from Naples, Italy, her research focuses on carbohydrate-binding proteins with potential antiviral applications. She has been dancing for 17 years and enjoys reading, travelling, and building LEGO sets. She is also very passionate about her research.
Rugile Januskeviciute
Rugile is a third-year PhD student at the Princess Maxima Centre, studying pediatric oncology. After completing a Master’s degree at Imperial College London, she investigates rhabdomyosarcoma and the tumour microenvironment using single-cell and multiomics approaches to understand how cancer evolves after treatment and to identify new therapeutic strategies for rare childhood cancers.
Sabine Jaegers
Sabine is a neurodivergent person, which means she grew up learning the unwritten rules of school and work and jumping through neurotypical hoops before she ever learned academic rules. Her experiences motivated her to pursue research on neurodivergence in the workplace and she is now a PhD researcher at Utrecht University. She studies what does(n’t) work for organizations wanting to become more neuroinclusive and how neurotypical expectations play a role in this.
Sanne Liefers
Sanne is a third year PhD-student. She has a bachelor degree in International Studies, and a bachelor degree in law. She has a master's degree in Public International Law. After her internship at the Dutch embassy in Canada, she started as a PhD student at Utrecht University. Her PhD-research regards the role of corporate law in facilitating investments in sustainable enterprises.
Sarah Schmidt
Sarah Schmidt is from Germany and is a first-year PhD candidate in Inorganic Chemistry and Catalysis, focusing on sustainable recycling and innovative methods to recover valuable materials. When she is not in the lab, she enjoys horseback riding and exploring new places.
Sef van den Beuken
Sef is an anesthesiology resident, currently writing a PhD in the ICU department, focussing on methodology of trials.
Soe Yu Naing
Soe Yu Naing is a Myanmar-born public health professional and researcher with over a decade of work experience. Trained in neuroscience and infectious diseases, he works at Utrecht University on genomics, antimicrobial resistance, and One Health, while managing international transdisciplinary research, teaching, and pursuing a multisectoral PhD in Indonesia.
Thomas Noordzij
Thomas is a 4th year PhD student at the Hubrecht institute. He has done his bachelor biomedical sciences and master CSND at the UU, where he developed a main interest in image-based exploration of biology. During his PhD in the Sonnen lab, he got the opportunity to develop systems allowing for microscopy-based analysis to answer long-standing questions in the field of human embryo implantation.
Vera Snijders
Vera is a PhD student at the Education and Pedagogy department and has a background in developmental psychology. She works in the Children and Language Mixing (CALM) project, where she uses day-long audio recordings and experimental tasks to find out why multilingual children mix their languages in conversation with others or within sentences.
Yaren Canten
Yaren is a PhD candidate at Utrecht University, working in the Division of Cell Biology, Neurobiology and Biophysics. In her research, she uses tiny roundworms to study how nerve cells and their support cells acquire their shape. Before starting her PhD, she studied Molecular Biology and Genetics in Turkey and completed a master’s degree in Cell Biology in Germany.
Yibei Liu
Yibei is a second year PhD candidate in Clinical Psychology. Her research focuses on improving the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for depression by developing approaches to personalize treatment based on individual differences. She grew up in China. Before her PhD, she obtaine her master's in Cognitive Neuroscience at Radboud University.