Avital Swisa is a biochemist and PhD student in the Department of Cellular Biochemistry and Human Genetics at The Hebrew University–Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem. She is currently writing her dissertation on “LKB1 role in pancreatic beta cell dynamics” under the supervision of Prof. Yuval Dor.

Avital is studying the role of the serine-threonine kinase LKB1 in beta cell dynamics, both in these cells’ replication and in their more functional and structural aspects. Among other things, her research focuses on understanding the replication kinetics of LKB1-deficient beta cells and changes in polarity in those cells.

Avital has already described for the first time a role for LKB1 in beta cells which expose new layers of biological regulation. These findings have been published in Cell Metabolism.

In addition to the Adams Fellowship, Avital has received a scholarship from the Ariane de Rothschild Women Doctoral Program and a prize from the Diabetes Research Center at the Hebrew University.