Professor Andriani Margariti

Basic and Clinical Sciences (BCS)

Professor Andriana Margariti is Professor of Vascular and Regenerative Medicine, with a long-standing research programme spanning cardiovascular disease, diabetes and its vascular complications, stem cell science and regenerative medicine. She obtained her PhD in Cardiovascular Medicine and Stem Cells from King’s College London in 2008 and is an Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. Her academic and research career includes internationally recognised institutions such as King’s College London, Queen’s University Belfast, Harvard University and the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).

Her research focuses on understanding how diabetes damages human blood vessels and the heart, leading to serious vascular and cardiovascular complications. A particular interest is why some disease-related changes persist over time and, critically, whether these changes can be therapeutically reversed to restore normal vascular function.

Professor Margariti has pioneered the development of advanced human, patient-derived models of disease. Using cellular reprogramming and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), her team can generate human vascular cells, engineered blood vessels and vascular networks, patient-derived vascular organoids and next-generation vascularised cardiac organoids. These models make it possible to study disease in human cells that reflect the genetic and biological background of individual patients.

Importantly, these approaches allow her team not only to identify molecular changes and proteins associated with diabetes and its complications, but also to determine whether they represent potential therapeutic targets. Her research has demonstrated that specific disease-associated changes observed in patient-derived cells can be modified pharmacologically, providing opportunities to discover new therapeutic strategies and explore new uses for existing medicines.

By combining patient-derived models with technologies including single-cell and spatial transcriptomics, gene editing and advanced molecular profiling, her research aims to understand the mechanisms that drive disease and translate these discoveries into more targeted and personalised therapeutic approaches. Her regenerative medicine programme also investigates whether reprogrammed human vascular cells can restore blood supply and contribute to the repair of damaged tissues.

The development of advanced human disease models is also central to Professor Margariti’s commitment to the 3Rs principles of Replacement, Reduction and Refinement, helping to reduce reliance on animal experimentation while developing experimental systems that more closely reflect human biology and disease.

Her research has been published in internationally recognised scientific journals and presented at universities and scientific conferences across Europe, the United States and Latin America, including the Gordon Research Conference. Her contributions have been recognised through awards including the BBSRC New Investigator Award and the Papanikolaou Prize. In 2022, she was selected as the first living “Innovator in Focus” at the Ulster Transport Museum in the UK.

At UNIC Athens, Professor Margariti is developing a multidisciplinary translational research programme connecting patients, scientists and clinicians. Her vision is to establish a pathway from the patient to the laboratory and from scientific discovery back to the patient, using patient-derived cells and advanced human models to improve understanding, prevention and treatment of diabetes and its cardiovascular complications.