Sine Lo Svenningsen

CV

Curriculum Vitae for Sine Lo Svenningsen

Female, 38 years old (11-04-1979), married, two daughters, Danish citizen.

Scientific profile

Molecular microbiologist focused on post-transcriptional gene regulation. Combines techniques from molecular biology, genetics, growth physiology and mathematical modelling to address fundamental questions in gene regulation, especially concerning RNA-centered regulatory mechanisms. Current focus on how bacteria use gene regulation dynamically to adapt to suboptimal conditions. Strong international network from 7 research years abroad.

Education

2008: Ph.D. Molecular biology, Princeton University, USA (November 6, 2008).

2005: M.A. Molecular biology, Princeton University, USA.

2003: Cand.Scient. Biology, UCPH, Denmark.

2001: B.Sc. Biology, UCPH, Denmark.

Employment

February 1, 2012-current: Associate Professor, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen.

Periods of leave:

• 2012 Maternity leave (32 weeks).
• 2013 Family care leave (terminally ill mother) (7 weeks).  
• 2015 Maternity leave (36 weeks).

2009-2012: FREJA tenure-track fellow, awarded by the Faculty of Science. Dept. of Biology, UCPH.

2008: Postdoctoral fellow, Dept. of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology, University of Ottawa, Canada, Prof. Thien-Fah Mah group.

2004-2008: PhD-student, Dept. of Molecular Biology, Princeton University, USA, Prof. Bonnie Bassler group.

2001-2002: Visiting Scientist, National Cancer Institute, NIH, USA, Dr. Sankar Adhya group.

Active grants

Center of Excellence for Bacterial Stress Response and Persistence, 2015-2021. One of six co-applicants.

Previous Grants

Research Grant, 2013-2015, The Danish Council for Independent Research, FNU. PI.

Research grant 2013-2015, The Lundbeck Foundation. Co-applicant.

Research Grant, 2011-2012, The Novo Nordisk Foundation. PI.

Research Grant 2010-2012, The Danish Council for Independent Research, FNU. PI.

Equipment Grant 2012. The Carlsberg Foundation. PI

FREJA 2-year fellowship, including my salary, one PhD-students salary, and laboratory start-up costs. From the Faculty of Natural Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark. 2009.

Student travel grant award from the American Society for Microbiology. 2008.

Leschly Family Foundation Fellowship. 2004.

Full scholarship to attend the 5-year Ph.D. program at Princeton University, awarded by the Dept. of Molecular Biology, Princeton University. 2003-2008.

Project management experience and current group structure

As PI of several previuos project grants, I have gained valuable experience in managing, facilitating, and stimulating collaborative research projects and lead them to their successful completion. My group currently consists of two postdocs, one co-supervised PhD-student (50%), five MSc students, 2 Bsc. students, and one technician (30%).

Talks and Seminars

Speaker, EMBO-EMBL symposium on New Approaches and Concepts in Microbiology, Germany, 2017.

Speaker, Discussion meeting on Conflict and Cooperation in Cellular Populations, India, 2016.

Speaker, Gordon Research Conference on Microbial Stress Response, Massachusetts, US, 2016.

Speaker, Mechanisms of Gene Regulation, Düsseldorf, Germany, 2014.

Speaker, ESF-EMBO symposium on Bacterial Networks. Warsaw, Poland, 2013.

Plenary speaker, Annual meeting of the Danish Society for Microbiology, 2013.

Speaker, International Conference on Mathematical Biology, Bangalore, India, 2011.

Speaker, UK Society for General Microbiology. Edinburgh, Scotland, 2010.

Speaker, Symposium on Bacterial Cell Biology and Pathogenesis, Umeå University, Sweden. June 2009.

Speaker for the "Lambda Lunch" seminar series at the National Cancer Institute, NIH, MD, USA. May 2008.

Principal lecturer at the Geilo NATO Advanced Study Institute on Evolution from Cellular to Social Scales in Geilo, Norway, April 2007.

Invited speaker at the Science Café at the Institute of Molecular Biology, University of Copenhagen, January 2007.

Selected speaker at the Cold Spring Harbor meeting on Microbial Pathogenesis and Host Response. NY, USA, September 2005.

Invited speaker at the Banbury meeting on Quantitative Genetic Networks, NY, USA, March 2003.

Selected Organisational Activities

Editorial Board member for Nature’s Scientific Reports. 2017-

Main co-organizer of the 3^rd annual meeting of the Danish RNA Society, 2017.

Danish RNA Society, member of the board. 2016-

Danish Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Member of the board 2010-2013.

Appointed member of the Strategic Research Committee of the Dept. of Biology, UCPH. 2012-2016.

Co-organizer of four symposia on Women in Science (~800 participants total). 2013-2016.

Co-organizer: “Signals and Space: Spatio-temperal patterns in simple bio-systems”. PhD summer school. August 2011.

Organizer: “Small Talk: Chemical Communication in Bacteria”, Research symposium, Copenhagen, June 2010.

I regularly review manuscripts for international journals including ISME Journal, Molecular Microbiology, Journal of Molecular Biology, PLOS One, and Frontiers in Microbiology. 

Continued education

2011: Higher Education Teaching Programme (adjunktpædagogikum). Denmark.
2010: EMBO Laboratory Management Course. Leimen, Germany
2009: Microscopy in Microbial Systems. Umeå University, Sweden.

Teaching

Course coordinator and teacher, Dynamical models in molecular biology, University of Copenhagen, graduate level course in quantitative biology. 2017-current.

Course coordinator and teacher, Biological Dynamics, University of Copenhagen, graduate level course in quantitative biology. 2010-2016.

Lecturer, "Almen Molekylærbiologi" (general molecular biology), University of Copenhagen, 2009-current.

Lecturer, Molecular Microbiology, University of Copenhagen, 2016-current.

Primary fields of research

Dynamics of gene regulatory networks

Gene regulatory mechanisms

Small noncoding RNAs

Quorum sensing signal transduction

Bacteriophage lambda

Knowledge of languages

Danish

English