Claudia Fischbach is a German bioengineer who is the Stanley Bryer 1946 Professor of Biomedical Engineering at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

. She is Director of the Cornell Physical Sciences Oncology Center on the Physics of Cancer

Metabolism Metabolism (, from el, μεταβολή ''metabolē'', "change") is the set of life-sustaining chemical reactions in organisms. The three main functions of metabolism are: the conversion of the energy in food to energy available to run cell ...

Early life and education

Fischbach earned a master's degree in

pharmacy Pharmacy is the science and practice of discovering, producing, preparing, dispensing, reviewing and monitoring medications, aiming to ensure the safe, effective, and affordable use of medicines. It is a miscellaneous science as it links heal ...

from the

Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's sixth-oldest university in continuous operatio ...

. She worked toward her doctorate in pharmaceutical technology at the University of Regensburg. She then moved to

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

, where she worked in tissue engineering.

Research and career

In 2007, Fischbach joined Cornell University, where she started using biomedical engineering to better understand how to treat cancer. The progression of cancer is influenced by interactions with nearby cells and the extracellular matrix. Despite that, the majority of cancer studies do not replicate conditions outside of the body. Fischbach uses tissue engineering to design systems that let her lab model and investigate how these interactions influence tumor cells. She uses model systems to understand the biological strategies tumors adopt to modify bodily function, become more aggressive, and metastasize. Fischbach has extensively investigated the fundamental mechanisms that underpin breast cancer. For example, she showed that obesity can change the composition of breast tissue, which can promote disease progression. Moreover, she was supported by the Human Frontier Science Program to study the impact of breast cancer on the material properties of bone. She showed that exercise, which is often prescribed to prevent bone loss, could also help to protect people against metastatic cancer. In addition, her research demonstrated that

breast cancer Breast cancer is cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipple, a newly inverted nipple, or a re ...

can trigger distant bone growth, which could be a preemptive defense against metastasis.

Awards and honors

* 2015 Public Voices Fellow of The OpEd Project * 2016 Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering * 2017 Alexander von Humboldt Foundation * 2018 Fellow of the

Biomedical Engineering Society BMES (the Biomedical Engineering Society) is the professional society for students, faculty, researcher and industry working in the broad area of biomedical engineering. BMES is the leading biomedical engineering society in the United States and was ...

* 2022 Cornell University College of Engineering EPICC Award * 2023

Cellular and Molecular Bioengineering Momentum Award

Selected publications

* Siyoung Choi, Matthew A Whitman, Adrian A Shimpi, ... Claudia Fischbach (7 August 2023)
"Bone-matrix mineralization dampens integrin-mediated mechanosignalling and metastatic progression in breast cancer."
''Nature Biomedical Engineering''. PMID 37550422. * Bo Ri Seo, Xingyu Chen, Lu Ling, ... Claudia Fischbach (8 May 2020)
"Collagen microarchitecture mechanically controls myofibroblast differentiation."
''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences''. PMID 32385149. * Bo Ri Seo, Priya Bhardwaj, Siyoung Choi ... Claudia Fischbach (19 August 2015)
"Obesity-dependent changes in interstitial ECM mechanics promote breast tumorigenesis."
''Science Translational Medicine''. PMID 26290412. * Maureen E Lynch, Daniel Brooks, Sunish Mohanan, ... Claudia Fischbach (3 May 2013)
"In vivo tibial compression decreases osteolysis and tumor formation in a human metastatic breast cancer model."
''Journal of Bone and Mineral Research''. PMID 23649605. * Claudia Fischbach, Hyun Joon Kong, Susan X Hsiong, ... David J Mooney (6 January 2009)
"Cancer cell angiogenic capability is regulated by 3D culture and integrin engagement."
''Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences''. PMID 19126683.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fischbach, Claudia Year of birth missing (living people) Living people German biophysicists Women biophysicists 21st-century German biologists 21st-century German physicists 21st-century German women scientists Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni University of Regensburg alumni Harvard University people German emigrants to the United States Cornell University faculty Harvard University alumni