15 September 2022 – “My EMBO fellowship remains the highlight of my career,” says Margarita Zacharogianni, Medical Affairs Manager at Creative Pharma, a clinical research organization based in Attica. After completing her PhD in Utrecht, she returned to Greece looking for an opportunity to pursue her own research in the field of mTor signalling in cell growth pathways.
A two-year EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowship, which she completed at the Biomedical Research Foundation, Academy of Athens, enabled her to do just that. While some aspects of her work such as buying consumables seemed more arduous than in the Netherlands, she says she was amazed at how well equipped the institute was. “The infrastructure was state-of-the-art, we had everything we needed. I am thankful for the chance to do my research here in Greece,” she says.
Zacharogianni explains that Greece is a great place to be a student: “There are many lively and vibrant student cities in Greece with good institutes and facilities.” After her fellowship she moved into industry. The biomedical industry, says Zacharogianni, represents a significant part of the Greek economy: “All the large global pharmaceutical companies have branches here, and there are also the local pharmaceutical companies.”
