Aberdeen Section and Thistle Dental Academy: Challenges, recognition, and management of oral lichen planus

Karolin graduated from the University of Siena in 2004 with cum laude distinction. During her dental undergraduate programme she trained in molecular microbiology and developed a special interest for host-microbe interactions. After completing a PhD in Pathology at King’s College London in 2008, she worked as post-doctoral research associate and continued her involvement in 3 European Commission-funded projects  aimed at the development of anti-HIV-1 microbicides. During this time she received early clinical training in Oral Medicine at the King’s College London Dental Institute. She was promoted to Senior Clinical Lecturer in 2016 and Clinical Reader in 2021.

Since her appointment to the University of Aberdeen, she has secured research grant funding totalling over 1 million for national and international collaborative projects in which she is the principal investigator. She is a member of the Infection & Immunity Programme of the Institute of Medical Sciences, and leads the Microbial Diseases Research Group at the Institute of Dentistry, active in several research strands concerned with the study of microbe-host interactions at the mucosal interface.

She has been invited to give research seminars at a number prestigious institutions including Imperial College, University College London and the University of Glasgow. She has acted as external PhD examiner for UK and European institutions. She serves on European Commission research grant funding panels. Students and post-doctoral fellows of her team have received awards at both national (British Society for Oral Medicine; British Society of Periodontology) and international (HIV Research 4 Prevention) scientific conferences.