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For Worldwide Ladies’s Day NewsMedical speaks with Prof. Dr. Inge Herrmann about her groundbreaking work on the intersection of engineering, materials science, and healthcare innovation. She shares insights into her journey, the pressing want for developments in ladies’s well being, and the way her crew is pioneering biomedical options—together with a reversible hydrogel implant that would revolutionize gynecological therapies.
Prof. Dr. Herrmann, earlier than we dive into your groundbreaking analysis, might you introduce your self and share a bit about your profession journey? What led you to the intersection of engineering, materials science, and healthcare innovation?
I’ve at all times been drawn to challenges—the issues individuals stated have been too troublesome, too unconventional, or not meant for somebody like me. From a younger age, I knew I didn’t wish to observe the well-trodden path; I needed to discover the sides of what was doable. Science and engineering appealed to me as a result of they’re about fixing issues in ways in which haven’t been carried out earlier than. However I additionally noticed how sure fields—particularly these impacting ladies’s well being—have been ignored or dismissed as much less of a precedence.
That solely made me extra decided. That solely made me extra decided to carry focus and innovation to areas that had lengthy been underrepresented. I used to be by no means keen on merely becoming into current frameworks—I needed to problem them, evolve them, and push innovation in instructions others hadn’t thought of.
That is what led me to the intersection of chemistry, engineering, and medical innovation. My work focuses on growing cutting-edge biomedical options, from superior surgical adhesives to nanotechnology-enabled therapies and girls’s well being improvements. For me, science must be each daring and strategic—driving breakthroughs that instantly affect those that want them most.
The W-HEALTH program’s reversible hydrogel implant is a groundbreaking development in ladies’s reproductive well being. What impressed you to develop this expertise, and the way do you see it altering the way forward for gynecological therapies?
The inspiration for this expertise got here from a daring and unconventional determination—I employed a gynecologist to hitch my lab. This determination displays my perception that interdisciplinary collaboration is important to fixing real-world challenges. As a substitute of growing applied sciences in isolation, we began by listening to the precise issues surgeons and sufferers confronted. By this collaboration, we recognized a serious hole: a necessity for a reversible, non-hormonal technique for contraception—one that would additionally function a minimally invasive remedy for situations like endometriosis. Current choices both contain hormonal interventions with unwanted side effects or everlasting surgical procedures, leaving many ladies with few selections that match their wants.
That’s how we developed the reversible hydrogel implant—a trigger-responsive materials that may briefly occlude the fallopian tubes with out inflicting everlasting harm. It presents a protected, adaptable, and patient-centered resolution that displays our broader aim: growing improvements that align with the true wants of girls and healthcare suppliers.
This expertise has the potential to redefine gynecological therapies by offering a substitute for hormonal contraception, lowering the necessity for invasive surgical procedures, and providing a novel method to managing endometriosis by limiting retrograde menstruation, which is believed to contribute to the illness’s development. By prioritizing each effectiveness and high quality of life, this method can empower ladies with extra management over their reproductive well being.
Picture Credit score: PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock.com
Your analysis brings collectively materials science and drugs to develop novel biomedical options. Are you able to stroll us via the science behind the reversible hydrogel implant and the way it works to regulate blood circulation within the fallopian tubes?
This hydrogel implant is designed to briefly and reversibly occlude the fallopian tubes with out inflicting everlasting harm. It really works by leveraging trigger-responsive supplies that may be deployed via a minimally invasive process, forming a short lived bodily barrier. The hydrogel is engineered to degrade and be safely eliminated when now not wanted, restoring fertility.
In contrast to conventional contraceptive strategies that depend on hormones or everlasting sterilization, this method presents a non-hormonal, mechanical resolution that meets the wants of a various affected person inhabitants.
Historically, medical analysis has underrepresented female-specific situations. The W-HEALTH program challenges this disparity by specializing in illnesses akin to endometriosis and gynecological cancers. How do you hope your analysis will bridge these vital gaps in ladies’s well being?
For a lot too lengthy, ladies’s well being has been underfunded and deprioritized in medical innovation. Circumstances like endometriosis and gynecological cancers have an effect on hundreds of thousands, but they’ve traditionally obtained much less consideration than different well being priorities. This hole has led to delayed diagnoses, restricted remedy choices, and a necessity for better scientific understanding.
The W-HEALTH program is about altering that narrative. By bringing collectively engineers, clinicians, and supplies scientists, we’re growing high-impact biomedical options that instantly tackle these unmet wants. By integrating cutting-edge materials science with real-world scientific wants, we will transfer past incremental enhancements and create transformative options. This isn’t nearly scientific progress—it’s about making certain that girls’s well being receives the eye, funding, and urgency it deserves.
Picture Credit score: illustrissima/Shutterstock.com
As a pacesetter in engineering and medical analysis, what recommendation do you could have for younger ladies aspiring to enter STEM fields, notably in disciplines historically dominated by males?
Get snug with difficult assumptions and pushing past societal expectations. If you wish to thrive in STEM—particularly in historically male-dominated fields—it’s important to be keen to assume in a different way, query norms, and persist within the face of doubt. Folks could have expectations of you—typically limiting ones.
However what really defines your profession is the way you select to problem these assumptions. A very powerful breakthroughs don’t come from enjoying it protected—they arrive from pushing previous what others assume is feasible.
Your analysis spans disciplines, bridging engineering, materials science, and drugs. How necessary is interdisciplinary collaboration in driving breakthroughs in healthcare, and the way can we create extra inclusive analysis environments?
Interdisciplinary collaboration isn’t simply necessary—it’s important. The most important breakthroughs in healthcare don’t occur in isolation; they emerge when engineers, materials scientists, and clinicians come collectively, bringing totally different views to the desk. No single self-discipline has all of the solutions, however once we mix experience and problem one another’s considering, we will develop really transformative options.
Creating extra inclusive analysis environments begins with respect—valuing alternative ways of considering and being open to views outdoors your personal area. It means fostering a tradition the place questions are inspired, experience is shared, and innovation isn’t restricted by conventional boundaries. Science advances once we hear, collaborate, and construct on one another’s strengths. That’s the place actual affect occurs.
Congratulations on receiving the Falling Partitions Science Breakthrough of the 12 months 2024 Ladies’s Affect Award! What does this recognition imply to you, and the way do you hope it can encourage additional developments in ladies’s healthcare?
Thanks! Receiving the Falling Partitions Ladies Breakthrough Award in partnership with the Elsevier and Volkswagen Foundations is an unbelievable honor. Greater than a private recognition, I see it as a robust assertion that girls’s well being innovation deserves to be on the forefront of scientific breakthroughs. For too lengthy, female-specific situations like endometriosis, gynecological cancers, and reproductive well being have been underfunded, understudied, and underestimated.
This award highlights the urgency of adjusting that. I hope it sends a transparent message that investing in ladies’s well being isn’t nearly fairness—it’s about scientific progress and bettering healthcare for half the inhabitants. I additionally hope this recognition evokes extra scientists, engineers, and clinicians to push boundaries on this house, to ask daring questions, and to develop applied sciences that actually tackle the unmet wants in ladies’s healthcare.
Most significantly, I hope it encourages younger researchers—particularly ladies—to step into management roles, problem the established order, and drive the change we nonetheless want.
Your analysis is breaking a number of limitations—from advancing female-specific healthcare options to making sure accessibility in low-resource settings. In case you needed to outline the largest “wall” your work is breaking, what wouldn’t it be and why?
The most important «wall» we’re breaking is the historic neglect of female-specific well being situations in medical innovation. Ladies’s well being has usually been handled as a distinct segment space quite than a central focus in biomedical analysis. Our work is altering this by growing technology-driven options that tackle pressing unmet wants. This additionally extends to making sure equitable entry to healthcare improvements, notably in low-resource settings the place reproductive healthcare stays a problem.
Worldwide Ladies’s Day is a second to have a good time achievements, increase consciousness, and push for motion. In your view, what are probably the most pressing steps society should take to actually #AccelerateAction towards gender equality in science and healthcare?
Cease assuming. Too many instances, individuals have determined for me—what I might obtain, what was “reasonable,” what was “too bold.” They have been mistaken. If we really wish to #AccelerateAction towards gender equality in science and healthcare, we don’t want particular remedy or additional assist. We simply want equal alternatives, the identical degree of belief, and the liberty to pursue daring concepts with out being second-guessed.
There may be hope – Elsevier’s gender report discovered that girls now represent 41% of lively researchers globally, up from 28% 20 years in the past. Grants for girls are rising steadily – though these positive factors will not be robust sufficient to maintain tempo with the rise within the proportion of girls lively researchers.
- Fund concepts based mostly on advantage, not bias. Ladies-led initiatives are sometimes met with extra skepticism. If we decide concepts by their true potential quite than outdated assumptions, breakthroughs will observe.
- Guarantee management relies on expertise, not outdated norms. Ladies are simply as able to main in STEM and healthcare—but we nonetheless see gaps on the prime. Fixing this isn’t about favoring ladies; it’s about stopping the systemic biases that push them out.
- Prioritize ladies’s well being analysis. It’s not a distinct segment matter—it’s half the inhabitants. Equal funding and a spotlight in biomedical innovation must be the usual, not the exception.
We don’t want additional assist. We simply want the limitations eliminated and the identical enjoying area as everybody else.
In case you might envision the perfect future for girls in science and healthcare, what wouldn’t it appear like? And what message would you wish to share with the following era of girls changemakers on this Worldwide Ladies’s Day?
The best future for girls in science and healthcare is one the place gender is now not a think about alternative, recognition, or management. A future the place ladies aren’t seen because the exception within the room however as scientists, engineers, and innovators—at first. My greatest collaborators don’t consider me as a lady in engineering—they consider me as an engineer. That’s the longer term we should always try for: the place competence speaks louder than assumptions, the place concepts matter greater than stereotypes, and the place expertise is judged with out bias.
To the following era of girls changemakers: Be relentless. Don’t waste power preventing to suit into outdated molds—break them. If somebody tells you your thought is not possible, take it as a problem. Encompass your self with individuals who see your expertise, not your gender. Science wants daring thinkers, not rule-followers. The longer term received’t change by itself—we have now to construct it, disrupt it, and personal it.
Additional Studying
About Professor Inge Herrmann
Inge Herrmann, an ETH Zurich engineer, is a Professor of Medical Know-how Innovation on the College of Zurich, Balgrist College Hospital, and Swiss Federal Labs. Her lab focuses on growing the instruments and applied sciences shaping the way forward for drugs.
These improvements advance diagnostics and remedy, translating into scientific functions and profitable ventures. Her achievements embody the Eccellenza Professorial Award, Latsis Prize, and Largiader Award.
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