Leah Gilbert

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 leah.gilbert@unifr.ch
 +41 26 300 9603
 https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0580-0141

Senior Researcher
Center for Food Science

+41 26 300 9603

Biography

Dr Leah Gilbert is a Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor at the University of Fribourg within the Food Research and Innovation Center on since October 1st 2024. Prior roles have included being a Research Affiliate at the Sydney Medical School, Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney and a Principal Investigator and Postdoctoral Researcher at the Charles Perkins Center at the Nepean Hospital, in Sydney, Australia. She received her master degree in Child and Adolescent Psychology in 2016 and her PhD in Life Sciences in 2021 in Lausanne, Switzerland. For her PhD she was awarded Summa Cum Laude for all of the aspects of her thesis: thesis defense presentation, scientific research and written thesis.

Her research focuses on maternal and offspring mental and metabolic health and on solutions to reduce mental health issues as well as the development of metabolic disorders in the mother and the offspring. She is currently investigating this with a team in Australia, a team in Switzerland and another in the United Kingdom. She authored and co-authored over 25 scientific papers in international and peer-reviewed journals such as Frontiers in Psychology, Psychoneuroendocrinology, Journal of Psychosomatic Research and BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth.

Dr Gilbert received a Postdoc.Mobility grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation to conduct her postdoctoral research in Sydney, Australia. Her PhD and early Postdoc were funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation and Novo Nordisk.

She recently received a travel grant for her oral presentation at the Australian Diabetes in Pregnancy Society. She was also awarded the jury prize during her participation in "My thesis in 180 seconds" in 2018 for her outstanding competencies in oral communication and translation of science into a public presentation.

During her PhD she held the role of Lifestyle coach and counseled more than 50 women during the perinatal period about their eating and physical activity habits as well as their mental health through motivational interviewing, mindfulness and supervised cognitive behavioral therapy. Dr Gilbert is invited yearly to share her clinical expertise by teaching specialized nurse practitioners about motivational interviewing techniques at the Institute of Higher Education and Research in Healthcare, in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Research and publications