Luojiao Huang obtained her BSc degree in Pharmacy at China Pharmaceutical University. Later, she joined the master's program at Peking Union Medical College, focusing on developing ambient mass spectrometry imaging methods for performing molecular pathological diagnosis of thyroid tumors. To explore new analytical possibilities for understanding disease mechanisms, she started PhD research at Leiden University. Her project aimed at characterizing the metabolic dysregulation related to Parkinson's disease neurodegeneration. To address the research question, she developed and applied high-throughput and quantitative metabolomics, assisted with stable isotope tracing, for studying in vitro neuronal models. She also developed an automated data analysis pipeline for metabolic flux analysis to monitor metabolic network activity.
Following her interest in expanding her expertise from metabolomics into proteomics, she joined the MERLN institute in March 2023. Her current project aims to characterize metabolites and protein biomarkers in various in vitro models of osteoarthritis. From a technical perspective, she will also design new bioengineered tissue constructs as quality control standards used for mass spectrometry imaging in clinical diagnostics.