IMSIS Region Europe – Executive Committee

CBMN, France

Dr. Nicolas Desbenoit joined the CNRS in 2017 as researcher. He is an analytical chemist specialized in mass spectrometry imaging (MSI) based on MALDI. His research focuses on methodological developments to investigate the distribution of any biomolecules (lipids, metabolites, drugs, peptides/proteins,  etc.) within tissue sections applied to biomedical research. His current work with his collaborators and students, is focused on the development of the challenging multimodal imaging associating MALDI-MSI with other modalities including vibrational spectroscopies (infrared, Raman), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and immunohistochemistry.

LUMC, Netherlands

Dr. Nina Ogrinc is a researcher at the Center for Proteomics and Metabolomics (CPM) at LUMC, working in the Mass Spectrometry Imaging (MSI) group. Her work focuses on understanding molecular interactions within tissues and their roles in disease, using MSI to map spatial molecular profiles and identify biomarkers such as lipids, metabolites, and proteins, with a strong emphasis on cancer and clinical translation.

She obtained her PhD from the University of Ljubljana and the Jožef Stefan Institute (2015), where she developed a novel SIMS probe for subcellular tissue analysis. She then joined Prof. Ron Heeren’s group at AMOLF/M4I as a postdoctoral researcher in the Marie Curie BRAINPATH project, applying multimodal MSI to investigate neurodegeneration and brain plasticity.

In 2018, she moved to Inserm U1192 (University of Lille), contributing to the SpiderMass project and developing one of the first prototypes for in vivo molecular MSI for real-time surgical guidance. Currently, at CPM, she integrates spatial multi-omics approaches to characterize disease phenotypes and translate biomarkers into applications ranging from diagnostics to therapy.

University of Edinburgh, UK

Shazia Khan is a Fellow at the Centre for Cardiovascular Science (CVS), Queen’s Medical Research Institute (QMRI), University of Edinburgh. She holds a Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (PGCAP) and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA), reflecting her commitment to excellence in teaching, mentoring, and academic leadership. She is a leading expert in Mass Spectrometry Imaging (MSI) within the Mass Spectrometry Core Group of Edinburgh Clinical Research Facility (CRF).

After completing her PhD in 2009 from H.E.J. Research Institute of Chemistry, University of Karachi, she served as an Assistant Professor at the COMSATS Institute, Lahore, until 2010. From 2011-2014, Shazia worked as a research assistant at Bioscience Department – Swansea University on fungal secondary metabolites analysis by GCMS and as a visiting scholar at Strathclyde Institute of Pharmacy and Biomedical Sciences (SIPBS) on LCMS-based metabolomics profiling.

Currently, she is actively engaged in multiple collaborative research projects involving Mass Spectrometry Imaging (MSI) for the analysis of small molecules and lipids in various tissues and disease models including brain, kidney, liver, heart, skin etc. using MALDI and DESI on FT-ICR-MS and SYNAPT G2Si. Her research interest primarily revolved around Mass Spectrometry Imaging of tissues for both targeted and untargeted analysis as well as MSI and LCMS-based metabolomics and lipidomics for biomarkers discovery.

Shimadzu, Germany

Ann-Christin studied Chemistry at the University of Münster, Germany and finished her Master of Science Chemistry in 2013. Her thesis focused on elemental bioimaging of metal-tagged drug delivery systems by laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (LA-ICP-MS). During her PhD, she performed complementary imaging using MALDI-MS for molecular, and LA-ICP-MS for elemental imaging. Analysis has been performed on different samples such as tumor spheroids, rat brain sections and human brain tumors. Furthermore, multimodal analysis with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) were carried out. She finished 2016 her PhD at the University of Münster, Germany in the research group of Prof. Uwe Karst and received for her thesis the Wolfgang Paul Study Award from the German Society of Mass Spectrometry (DGMS) as well as the DAAS Award from the work group Analytical Spectroscopy of the German Society of Chemistry. Dr. Niehoff is currently working at Shimadzu Europa GmbH, Duisburg, Germany, for the European Innovation Center – Imaging. The focus of her work is to establish collaborations with scientific researchers for the development of new applications and technologies in the field of imaging.

University of Milano-Bicocca, italy

Prof. Andrew Smith graduated in Forensic and Analytical Science from Sheffield Hallam University in 2013, before completing his PhD in Molecular and Translational Medicine at the University of Milano-Bicocca in 2017. He is currently an Associate Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy, where he leads the Spatial Omics group within the Proteomics and Metabolomics facility.

His research focuses on the application of spatial multi-omics approaches, particularly MALDI-MSI to advance molecular pathology. His work centres on characterising the tumour–immune landscape of renal cancers and developing innovative tools to support the pathological assessment of rare kidney diseases.

MSI Solutions, UK

After graduating from the University of Hull in 1984 Peter did a PhD at the University of Reading in collaboration with ICI Plant Protection Division (now Syngenta) at Jealott’s Hill, Berkshire. He joined Glaxo (now GlaxoSmithKline) in February 1988 as a Natural Product Extraction Chemist before moving into the mass spectrometry group in 1993. His many roles included the development of methodologies for analysing compounds from single resin beads as part of the combinatorial chemistry era. This work also included the use of Inductively Coupled Plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) which led us into MALDI MS imaging about 12 years ago. Peter pioneered the introduction of MALDI MS Imaging into GSK and was an active member of the recent European Union Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) Action for MALDI MS Imaging representing the UK. In this capacity, Peter was instrumental in organising and co-running several workshops for the advancement of techniques for On-Tissue Digestion prior to MALDI Imaging analysis. Peter was part of the original Team that helped co-found the Mass Spectrometry Imaging Society (MSIS) and is currently serving as the Industrial Link on the board of the MSIS. Peter’s use of MALDI MS Imaging has recently morphed into Ultra High Throughput Screening by MALDI and through a collaboration between GSK, Bruker and Analytik Jena/Cybio has led to the development of a fully Automated system that has the potential to spot and analyse a full diversity 2 million compound assay in ~8 days.

Imperial College London, England

Stefania is a postdoctoral researcher at Imperial College London Analytical Chemist London, England

TU Wien & University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, Austria

Martina has been working in the field of Instrumental Bioanalytical Chemistry for more than 20 years with a special focus on mass spectrometry, separation sciences, biomolecule identification and detailed characterization. She is a well-known expert in proteomics, glycomics focussing on method development, future directing applications of mass spectrometry and instrument improvements. Since 2009 she has established MALDI mass spectrometric imaging in Austria and is an internationally recognized expert in the field building her capacities through European based networks and national collaborations in the fields of Life Sciences and Material Sciences. Current research is focused on 1) applying MALDI and DESI as soft ionization techniques for surface analysis in the field of MSI; 2) developing sample preparation strategies to gather omics information from sample surfaces and combine this strategy with classical LC-MS approaches; and 3) combining the emerging field of MS imaging with methodologies traditionally used in other fields, i.e. MRI, CT, PET, IR, Raman (medicine) or XRF, and AFM (material sciences), building a strong basis for new developments in multimodal imaging.

Pisa, Italy

Liam obtained an MCHEM in Chemistry from the University of Oxford, UK, and a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Warwick, UK. Following a post-doctoral researcher position at the FOM institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics in Amsterdam, he started his own research group at Leiden University Medical Center, where he is Associate Professor. He is director of Proteomics at the Fondazione Pisana per la Scienza, and Vice-President of the Mass Spectrometry Imaging Society.

Maastricht, The Netherlands

Ron obtained a PhD degree in technical physics in 1992 at the University of Amsterdam on plasma-surface interactions. He was the research group leader at FOM-AMOLF for macromolecular ion physics and biomolecular imaging mass spectrometry. In 2001 he was appointed professor at the chemistry faculty of Utrecht University lecturing on the physical aspects of biomolecular mass spectrometry. In the period 1995-2015 he has been developing new approaches towards high spatial resolution and high throughput molecular imaging mass spectrometry using Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry and Matrix Assisted Laser Desorption and Ionization. He was the research director for emerging technologies within the Netherlands Proteomics Centre from 2008-2013. In 2012 he co-founded Omics2Image B.V., a company focused on bringing innovative ion detector technology to the analytical market. In 2014 he was appointed as distinguished professor and Limburg Chair at the University of Maastricht. He is one of the scientific directors of M4I, the Maastricht MultiModal Molecular Imaging institute and heads the division of imaging MS. He is the elected treasurer and executive board member of the international mass spectrometry foundation and serves on various editorial boards of peer-reviewed journals. He is and has been active in many professional societies to advance mass spectrometric research, education and professionalization. His publication record encompasses an excess of 200 peer-reviewed publications and his H-index is 38. His academic research interests are the fundamental studies of the energetics of macromolecular systems, conformational studies of non-covalently bound protein complexes, translational imaging research, high-throughput bioinformatics and the development and validation of new mass spectrometry based proteomic imaging techniques for the life sciences.