Faculty of Science, Technology and Medicine
Faculty of Law, Economics and Finance
Faculty of Humanities, Education and Social Sciences
Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust
Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine
Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History
Luxembourg Centre for European Law
Luxembourg Centre for Socio-Environmental Systems
Supported by the Gerhard und Ilse Schick Stiftung, the Research Stay grants of the Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine (LCSB) enable short term visits to partner laboratories abroad, giving researchers the opportunity to access expertise and technologies outside Luxembourg, and to build partnerships.
In 2025, the grants supported stays of early-career researchers Lucia Gallucci, Lorina Bilalli and Elle Wilson at internationally recognised research centres. Lucia Gallucci visited the Radboud University Medical Center in the Netherlands, where she acquired advanced expertise in stem cell differentiation and in the generation of astrocytes, specialised brain cells that play a key role in rare neurological disorders. Lorina Bilalli carried out her research stay at Charité Berlin in Germany, where she learned new imaging skills that make it possible to visualise in great detail the protein synthesis machinery in brain cells and how it changes in the early stages of Parkinson’s disease. Dr Elle Wilson spent her stay at Juntendo University in Tokyo where she discovered new laboratory tools to study genes linked to Parkinson’s disease and strengthened the ongoing collaboration with the Japanese institution.
Across all stays, the researchers worked closely with host teams, contributed to ongoing projects and gained practical experience in different research environments. Learning from international experts strengthened their skills while bringing fresh ideas as well as cutting-edge data and methods back to the LCSB. “These grants illustrate how targeted philanthropy helps early-career researchers to grow, accelerates knowledge exchange and fosters international collaborations,” concludes Dr Kristina Hondrila, fundraiser at the LCSB. “We are very grateful to the Schick Foundation for making these research stays possible.”
Discover the LCSB Research Stays in pictures
Lucia in the Netherlands
Meet Lucia Gallucci, a doctoral researcher in the Enzymology & Metabolism group at the LCSB. She shares her experience from a short research stay at Radboud University Medical Center in Nijmegen.
A big thank you also to Prof. Nael Nadif Kasri and his team in Nijmegen for the warm welcome and cooperation.
Lorina in Germany
Meet Lorina Bilalli, doctoral researcher in the Gene Expression Dynamics group at the LCSB. She shares her experience from a research stay at the Charité in Berlin.
A huge thank you to the Institute of Medical Physics and Biophysics, led by Professor Christian Spahn, and to Dr Magdalena Schacherl and their teams for the warm welcome and ongoing collaboration.
Elle in Japan
Meet Dr Elle Wilson, a postdoctoral researcher in the Integrative Cell Signalling group at the LCSB. She shares her experience from a three-week research stay at Juntendo University.
Special thanks to the Department of Neurology, Prof. Nobutaka Hattori, Prof. Manabu Funayama, Prof. Imai Yuzuru and their teams for making Elle’s stay such a memorable experience!