PhD defence Margarita Georgieva Pencheva
Supervisors: Prof. Dr. Casper G. Schalkwijk, Prof. Dr. María Soledad Fernández-Alfonso
Co-supervisors: Dr. Ir. Koen D. Reesink, Dr. Ir. Bart Spronck
Keywords: Methylglyoxal, Glycation, Arterial stiffening, Interdisciplinary research
"Methylglyoxal as a double-edged sword in arterial stiffening Interdisciplinary insights"
In the present thesis, we pursued two major aims, combining expertise from the biological and biomechanical engineering fields. First, we investigated whether the endogenously overproduced MGO in various CVD-related disease models has a direct role in the onset of arterial stiffening and whether it can be targeted preventively. Additionally, we investigated whether the epidemiological data suggesting a beneficial effect of exogenous MGO could be confirmed experimentally. Second, we developed an experimental pipeline involving multidisciplinary expertise and multi-scale measurements. Such approach is not only efficient in utilizing experimental animals, materials, and resources, but also allows more rigorous differentiation between mechanisms at play.
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