Katharina F Heil
Programme Manager Communities & Training, ELIXIR, Europe’s life science research infrastructure
German, living in Barcelona, Spain & Cambridge, UK
Dr. Katharina F Heil is ELIXIR’s Programme Manager Communities & Training and past president of the Erasmus Mundus Association. She has operational and strategic oversight of ELIXIR’s Communities, bringing together experts across Europe to develop standards, services and training within specific life science domains. Additionally, Katharina coordinates ELIXIR Training Platform activities, to strengthen and grow bioinformatics training capacity and competence across Europe. She also contributes to the strategic coordination of European projects.
Her work ensures alignment of ELIXIR Communities and Platforms, allowing ELIXIR, an intergovernmental organisation and Europe’s Research Infrastructure for life sciences to successfully bring together life science resources across Europe. The main aim being service and resource coordination to form a single infrastructure, supporting the mission of Open Life Science, following the FAIR principles. This role allows her to shape and enable interdisciplinary research across Europe and globally, and benefits from her excellent communication skills. She received a joint PhD from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland/UK and KTH, Sweden in 2017.
As the past President of the Erasmus Mundus Association, she advocates for Higher Education and shapes its future. She’s a role model for many young internationals and convinced about the impact of education, especially in STEMM. Katharina sees knowledge as a key enabler to develop a global understanding in an international, intercultural and interdisciplinary world, all of which is very much needed for action towards environmental protection and climate change.
