Biography
Julia joined the Nijagal Lab in 2025 as a postdoctoral fellow, bringing with her a strong background in immunology and a keen interest in the liver’s immune landscape. Her previous research centered on the development of fibrosis in the adult liver, and she is now expanding that work by investigating the spatial interactions between hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs) and cholangiocytes/epithelial cells in the perinatal liver.
Julia holds an MS in Biotechnological Engineering and Pharmaceutical Technology from Lund Institute of Technology in Sweden. During her studies, she spent a semester at the University of Southern California, where she worked in a pharmaceutical lab focused on drug design and targeted delivery systems, an experience that sparked her appreciation for California and its research environment.
She returned to Sweden and earned her PhD in Medical Sciences from Lund University with a dissertation focused on liver immunology. Julia defended her thesis during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and while waiting for the world to open up again she worked as a Project Manager at a Biotech incubator in Umeå, Sweden. In 2021 she received an International Postdoctoral Grant from the Swedish Research Council, to continue her academic research training in a Tissue Immunology lab at UCSF, and moved back to California.
Education
PhD in Medical Sciences, Biomedicine 2020, Lund University, Medical Faculty, Dep. of Experimental Medical Sciences. Sweden.