Meritxell Huch (

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

, 1978) is a stem cell biologist and director at the

Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics __NOTOC__ The Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) is a biology research institute located in Dresden, Germany. It was founded in 1998 and was fully operational in 2001. More than twenty research groups work in m ...

. Her research considers tissue regeneration and the development of tissue-specific disease models for human organs. She was awarded a European Research Council Consolidator Grant in 2023.

Early life and education

After college Huch decided she wanted to work in science because of a desire to understand how aspirin works. Huch was an undergraduate student at the

University of Barcelona The University of Barcelona ( ca, Universitat de Barcelona, UB; ; es, link=no, Universidad de Barcelona) is a public university located in the city of Barcelona, Catalonia, in Spain. With 63,000 students, it is one of the biggest universities i ...

, where she studied pharmaceutical sciences. She remained there for her graduate studies, earning a Master in 2003 and doctorate in 2007. She completed her PhD research in the

Centre for Genomic Regulation The Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG, ''Centre de Regulació Genòmica'' in Catalan) is a biomedical and genomics research centre based on Barcelona. Most of its facilities and laboratories are located in the Barcelona Biomedical Research Par ...

, where she worked alongside Cristina Fillat. After completing her doctoral research she spent a year as a postdoctoral fellow before moring to the

Hubrecht Institute The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...

on a

Marie Curie Marie Salomea Skłodowska–Curie ( , , ; born Maria Salomea Skłodowska, ; 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934) was a Polish and naturalized-French physicist and chemist who conducted pioneering research on radioactivity. She was the first ...

Fellowship. In

Utrecht Utrecht ( , , ) is the fourth-largest city and a municipality of the Netherlands, capital and most populous city of the province of Utrecht. It is located in the eastern corner of the Randstad conurbation, in the very centre of mainland Net ...

she worked in the laboratory of

Hans Clevers Johannes (Hans) Carolus Clevers (born 27 March 1957) is a Dutch molecular geneticist, cell biologist and stem cell researcher. He became the Head of Pharma, Research and Early Development, and a member of the Corporate Executive Committee, of ...

, where she isolated the stem cells responsible for the turnover of the adult stomach.

Research and career

Huch was appointed a Sir Henry Dale Research Fellow at the

Gurdon Institute The Gurdon Institute (officially the Wellcome/Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute) is a research facility at the University of Cambridge, specialising in developmental biology and cancer biology. History The Institute was founded in 1989 to prov ...

at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

. She held a joint position with

The Wellcome Trust The Wellcome Trust is a charitable foundation focused on health research based in London, in the United Kingdom. It was established in 1936 with legacies from the pharmaceutical magnate Henry Wellcome (founder of one of the predecessors of Glax ...

and the Department of Physiology. After five years in Cambridge, Huch joined the

as one of the first members of the Lise Meitner Excellence Program. She was appointed to the board of directors in 2022. Inflammation and tissue damage are associated with chronic liver disease and cancer. Her group have extensively developed human organoid models to study the molecular basis of adult tissue regeneration. Having identified stem cells responsible for the rapid turnover of the adult stomach, Huch showed that they could be maintained in culture. Next she moved on to

liver cells A hepatocyte is a cell of the main parenchymal tissue of the liver. Hepatocytes make up 80% of the liver's mass. These cells are involved in: * Protein synthesis * Protein storage * Transformation of carbohydrates * Synthesis of cholesterol, ...

, demonstrating the replicative potential of

progenitor cell A progenitor cell is a biological cell that can differentiate into a specific cell type. Stem cells and progenitor cells have this ability in common. However, stem cells are less specified than progenitor cells. Progenitor cells can only differ ...

s during regeneration and showing they are promising candidates for future therapeutic interventions in liver diseases. Her research has the potential to reduce the use of animals in scientific research.

Select publication

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Awards and honours

* 2016 The Hamdan Award for Medical Research Excellence Hamdan Awards * 2017 The Women in Cell Biology Early Career Medal * 2018 Dame Sheila Sherlock Prize * 2018 Elected

EMBO Embo ( gd, Eurabol, IPA: �iaɾəpɔɫ̪ is a village in the Highland Council Area in Scotland and the former postal county of Sutherland, about north-northeast of Dornoch. On 16 July 1988, Embo declared itself independent from the rest of the ...

Young Investigator * 2019 The BINDER Innovation Prize * 2022 German Stem Cell Network Hilde Mangold Award * 2023 European Research Council Consolidator Grant

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Huch, Meritxell Scientists from Barcelona 1978 births Stem cell researchers Biologists from Catalonia Women biologists Spanish medical researchers Women medical researchers 21st-century biologists 21st-century Spanish women scientists University of Barcelona alumni Living people Max Planck Institute directors