Anneliene Jonker, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of therapeutic innovation in rare diseases research, at the University of Twente, in Enschede, The Netherlands. In this position she works at the interface of policy sciences, regulatory sciences and therapeutic innovation, in order to understand how to improve rare diseases research. In addition, she is also the Scientific Director for Duchenne Parent Project, the Netherlands, in which she is responsible for their scientific and care programs. Next to this, she is the Vice Chair of the Therapies Scientific Committee of the International Rare Diseases Research Consortium (IRDiRC), where she leads and participates in different Task Forces and Working Groups, such as the MedTech for Rare Diseases Working Group and the Drug Repurposing Guidebook. She is also an assistant Editor for Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases.
Anneliene has previously worked at the IRDiRC Scientific Secretariat, as Project and Communication Manager, and in this role has assisted many different Task Forces, and been involved with many of the different tasks of the consortium. Anneliene Jonker has had a long interest in rare diseases, was trained as a biomedical scientist, obtaining her PhD in genetics and metabolism of Ewing’ sarcoma, a rare childhood cancer, at Institut Curie, Paris, France. She obtained her master’s degree in translational sciences in gastrointestinal stromal tumour, a rare intestinal cancer, from the University of Leiden, for which she performed her research at Brigham’s and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States. In addition, she has a master’s degree in the history of medicine, dedicated to rare bone diseases, from the Free University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
