Bioethics

Daan Kenis is a doctoral researcher in Philosophy with a background in philosophy and pharmaceutical sciences. His research tackles questions at the intersection of philosophy of science and bioethics in the context of data-intensive healthcare, precision medicine, and molecular biology. His work employs insights from feminist philosophy of science, philosophy of science in practice, and social epistemology to address normative concerns in biomedical practice and healthcare.

Mayli Mertens is a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow at the Philosophy department of the University of Antwerp and the Founding Director of the Atlas Bioethics Center in San Jose, Spain. She investigates how sense-making, through human and artificial cognition, impacts the physical world. Her main scientific interest is in epistemology and global bioethics. She teaches on bias, critical thinking, and technological innovation.

Franlu Vulliermet is a doctoral researcher in Philosophy working on a normative account of environmental relationships in the context of pollution and epigenetics. His research engages with a variety of schools of thought, including non-Western perspectives informed by his time spent living with Indigenous populations in the Ecuadorian Rainforest. Prior to this, he was a research associate at INSEAD and Harvard Business School.

Varsha Aravind Paleri is a doctoral researcher in Philosophy. With a strong background in biotechnology and bioethics and extensive experience as a molecular biologist, her current doctoral research focuses on the ethics of synthetic biology. Her scholarly interests lie at the intersection of technological and environmental ethics, with a particular focus on understanding and applying non-Western philosophical frameworks—mainly Indian Hindu philosophy—to address complex ethical challenges in these domains.

Yanni Ratajczyk is a postdoctoral researcher in Philosophy at the University of Rijeka and the University of Antwerp. His research primarily focuses on moral philosophy, the philosophy of Iris Murdoch, and the intersection between ethics and aesthetics. He has published on narrative identity, moral creativity (the topic of his PhD), moral imagination, moral perception, and the philosophy of Iris Murdoch.

Emma Moormann is a postdoctoral researcher in Philosophy. Her PhD thesis discusses moral responsibility distributions in the context of epigenetics. She has since worked on a variety of projects related to (bio)ethics, including the philosophy of (step)parenthood, the concept of resilience in neurodiversity, and disability theory. Starting from 2025, she is project manager of the interdisciplinary project Death Care.

Christina Stadlbauer is an artist-researcher with a PhD in Chemistry and graduate studies from Apass, a post-master program for advanced performance and artistic research. Her practice explores relationships between humans and other-than-human life forms—including plants, animals, bacteria, and mycelium—seeking to re-negotiate our environmental connections. Working at the intersection of arts, sciences, and philosophy, Stadlbauer presents her research through installations, performances, rituals, and curated events.

Bart H. M. Vandeput (BE/FI), known as Bartaku, is an artist and researcher specializing in Bioart and intermedia art. His transdisciplinary practice explores the human condition through collaborations with plants, microbes, light, energy, and technology, integrating diverse entities, media, and disciplines into installations, interventions, exhibitions, talks, and lectures. He currently directs a research project on microbiomes in the cooling towers of nuclear facilities, involving artists and researchers from four universities in Belgium and Finland.

Nele Buyst is a doctoral researcher in Philosophy. She is currently working on an interdisciplinary project that uses the metaphor and practice of kintsugi to think about the concept of repair and to explore the potential of aesthetic practices to heal modern relations to surroundings. She is interested in feminist arts-based research methods, ecofeminism, and posthumanist philosophy. Alongside her research, she publishes poetry and is an editor of Rekto:Verso, a magazine for culture and critique.

Lisanne Meinen is a postdoctoral researcher with a background in cultural studies and philosophy. Her doctoral research focused on the cultural representation and phenomenological understanding of neurodivergence in and through videogames. She is currently developing a new research project on immersive technology and disability.

Kristien Hens is a full professor in Bioethics at the University of Antwerp. Her research interests include biological concepts, ethics of psychiatry, ethics of postgenomics, and environmental ethics. She has a particular interest in microbes and what they can teach us. She wrote Chance Encounters. A Bioethics for a Damaged Planet and Towards an Ethics of Autism.

Ina Devos is a doctoral researcher in Philosophy with a background in biotechnology and bioethics. Their current research focuses on the ethics of human proteomics, building on the fields of proteomics, bioethics, data ethics, and research ethics. They also have a specific commitment towards interdisciplinary research, collaborating with scholars of proteomics, bioinformatics, data science, philosophy of science, and science and technology.

Ilya Gordon Villafuerte is a research master’s student currently working on his doctoral application. He is mostly engaged with social ecology and relational ethics in urban contexts, and is a student assistant for this course.