Scientific Communications Committee: Ilse Jonkers

KU Leuven – University of Leuven

Human Movement Biomechanics Research Group

Leuven, Belgium

From my PhD onwards, I successfully bridged from a classical human movement science and physical therapy profile towards an integrated biomedical science and biomedical engineering profile, to advance the understanding of pathological movement, its effect on musculoskeletal, joint and cartilage tissue loading as well as cartilage homeostasis, degeneration and repair. I am confident that these fundamental insights into cartilage mechano-biology will define the corner stones of future rehabilitation and exercise programs that effectively target optimal cartilage health.

My group is conducting internationally highly competitive research and has produced leading and important contributions on the quantification of whole joint loading using multi-body simulation. Its work is known for the development of subject-specific musculoskeletal models containing a high level of anatomical detail to study children with cerebral palsy and degenerative joint disease. More recent research activities relate to cartilage mechanobiology, more specific the development of multi-scale modelling of bone and cartilage adaptation, bioreactor-based evaluation of loading-induced molecular cartilage adaptation and advanced medical imaging of cartilage.

In conclusion, integrating biomedical and engineering science, my research is highly multi-disciplinary by nature with the ultimate aim of fully exploiting a hybrid experimental and computer modelling approach to address fundamental and clinical questions where a biomechanist’s perspective can make a difference.