Professor Catherina Becker
Professor of Neural Development and Regeneration and Director of the Centre for Neuroregeneration.
University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom.

Venue: Queen’s Medical Research Institute, University of Edinburgh.
Date: 9 May 2016.

On Monday 9th May, Professor Catherina Becker delivered her Eurolife Distinguished Lecture entitled “Successful Regeneration of the Zebrafish Spinal Cord – Learning from the Pros” at the Queen’s Medical Research Institute.

Catherina was presented with her award by Professor Jordi Alberch vice-rector for Research, Innovation and Transfer at the University of Barcelona and Convener of Eurolife Steering Committee.

Short biography

Catherina Becker obtained an MRes in Human Genetics and a PhD in Neurosciences from the University of Bremen, Germany, studying development and successful regeneration of the amphibian (frogs and salamanders) central nervous system. For her first postdoctoral training post, she moved to the renowned Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zürich, Switzerland on an EMBO-funded postdoctoral fellowship. Here, together with her husband, Thomas Becker, she developed spinal cord injury in adult zebrafish as a genetically accessible model for successful CNS repair. Their studies continued at the University of California, and the Centre for Molecular Neurobiology in Hamburg, where they became group leaders. The Becker group moved to the University of Edinburgh in 2005 and Catherina Becker is now Professor for Neural Development and Regeneration and the Director of the Centre for Neuroregeneration. The Becker group use zebrafish to investigate spinal cord regeneration and mechanisms of motor neuron development and repair in motor neuron diseases.
Catherina is a founding member of EuFishBioMed, the European Society of Fish Models in Biology and Medicine, she is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology (FRSB) and the co-Director of the new Wellcome Trust funded 4 year PhD programme in Tissue Repair.