Our Team – PRECLINICAL SCIENCE

Preclinical Science

PRECLINICAL SCIENCE was founded in 2016 by Dr. Roman Föll and Dr. Lars Mecklenburg. It is registered in Münster, Germany, as Föll, Mecklenburg & Partner GmbH. Both founders and newly joined partner Dr. Geertje Lewin bring 30 years of experience in research and development into the business. We have a different focus, though, and supplement our experience with the expertise of partners with whom we maintain a very close working relationship. Our philosophy is a true partnership with our clients and an honest consultation at the highest scientific standard.

Laura-Katharina Bertels

Laura-Katharina Bertels finished her master degree in cellular and molecular biology at the University of Osnabrück in 2019 after obtaining a B.Sc. in Biotechnology from Hochschule Furtwangen University, Germany. Since 2016 she worked as a medical writer in preclinical drug development at Dr. Roman Föll Preclinical Services.

After the founding of Preclinical Science Föll, Mecklenburg & Partner GmbH she continued working for the company.

General Manager

Dr. Roman Föll studied biology/zoology at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, Germany. He made his PhD in biophysics and physiology. Dr. Föll was an assistant professor in zoo physiology at the Westfalian Wilhelms-University in Münster, Germany, and a scientist in inhalation toxicology at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma KG.

Later on, he became senior researcher and study director at ALTANA Pharma AG, where he supervised rodent toxicology and immunotoxicology. Since 2006, Dr. Föll works as an independent consultant in preclinical development for drugs and chemicals. He is a European Registered Toxicologist (ERT) since 2008, and has given lectures on toxicology in various academic programs throughout Germany.

Dr. Erinita Fröhlke

Dr. Erinita Fröhlke studied biology in Berlin, Aachen, Cologne and Heidelberg, Germany, obtained her diploma degree at the German Cancer Institute, Heidelberg and her PhD at the Westfalian Wilhelms-University in Muenster, Germany. She served for 20 years as quality control manager at various CROs and pharmaceutical companies.

Since 2014, Dr. Fröhlke works as a consultant and auditor for GLP (preclinical studies) and animal welfare issues. The services encompass audits on study performance, raw data and documents, quality system and SOPs, vendors/suppliers and for qualification. The experience in animal welfare issues includes qualification as Animal Welfare Officer, member of the IACUC (Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee). Dr. Fröhlke is an experienced trainer of courses in animal welfare laws according to German and international regulations.

Hayo Göhmann

Hayo Göhmann finished his education as advertising specialist in 1988 and as journalist and certified communication specialist in 1990. For 10 years, he managed various communication and event projects in the commercial and private sector and since 2000 was a freelanced provider for press and publicity services, writer, network organizer and managed logistics for a major publishing house.

Dr. Kerstin Hagemeister

Dr. Kerstin Hagemeister studied biology and laboratory animal science at the RWTH Aachen University, Germany. She achieved her PhD in theoretical medicine and is certified as a FELASA LAS specialist. During her PhD studies, she worked as a researcher for a medical device start-up company in Aachen, Germany. After the aqusition by Grünenthal GmbH Dr. Hagemeister led the preclinical development of the Adhesys Medical GmbH. After her time at Adhesys Medical, she served as Director Preclinical Services at a preclinical service provider in Brandenburg, Germany. She has extensive experience in the preclinical product development of medical devices class II and III as well as in the conduct of preclinical studies.

Dr. Jörg Herbst

Jörg is a Board-Certified Toxicologist in the EU (ERT) and the US (DABT) and Biopharmaceutical Manager with over 20 years of industry experience. Jörg holds a degree in Chemistry and received his PhD from the Institute of Toxicology at the University of Würzburg. He worked for a range of biotech companies as an expert in the field of non-clinical development and safety evaluation and thereby collected a proven track record of moving discovery projects of various molecular scaffolds into clinical development and towards market authorization.

Jörg has considerable experience in planning and execution of non-clinical safety and efficacy assessments and elaboration of program budgets and timing of such nonclinical packages in support of clinical programs in a broad range of indications and throughout all development stages. He profits from his profound knowledge on GLP requirements, regulatory guidelines on nonclinical development and his excellent contacts to numerous CROs. He has supervised a multitude of pivotal GLP toxicity and safety pharmacology studies and has authored several Investigator’s Brochures and other regulatory documents. He is experienced in European and US procedures concerning meetings with regulatory authorities.
Jörg is appointed as a full member to the Advisory Committee for pharmacologically active substances and veterinary drugs of the Federal Institute for Risk Assessment of Germany.

Prof. Robert Klopfleisch

Robert Klopfleisch studied veterinary medicine at the University of Leipzig and obtained his PhD at the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute and University Giessen. Robert Klopfleisch is a pathologist, certified by the American College of Veterinary Pathologists. He has extensive experience in the pathology evaluation of preclinical studies and has authored more than 170 publications.

Robert Klopfleisch works as an assistant professor for veterinary pathology at the Free University of Berlin and is an external consultant to Föll, Mecklenburg & Partner, where he evaluates slides from GLP and non-GLP toxicity studies and provides pathology expert reports.

Dr. Christina Kloth

Dr. Christina Kloth studied biology at the University of Rostock, Germany with a focus on animal physiology and neuroscience. She finished her PhD in Hannover, Germany at the Hannover Medical School and worked as a researcher in pharmacology and immunology. After 10 years in both teaching and research, she moved to experimental hematology to work as a project manager in a large multi-site project.

Gerhard Lewandovski

Gerhard Lewandovski studied biology/zoology at the Westfalian Wilhelms-University in Münster, Germany in the fields on morphology and zoophysiology. Combining both, a patented technique resulted for image based quantification of enzymes in histologic slides. After leading a company using this technique, he shifted as leading scientist and study director to a preclinical CRO for more than 10 years. Conducting preclinical toxicological, immuno- and other studies in rodents, he acquired a profound knowledge about preclinical studies. The last three years he worked as study monitor and project manager for a preclinical project (DNA biological), helping his clients from CRO selection to study plan and reporting service as well as GLP auditing (including LIMS) of the CROs conducting studies.

Dr. Geertje Lewin

General Manager

Dr. Geertje Lewin studied ecology and biology in Cambridge, US and Greifswald, Germany and obtained her PhD in zoophysiology. She worked as researcher and lecturer in pharmacology and toxicology at the Westfalian Wilhelms-University in Muenster, Germany. As a study director in reproductive toxicology and risk assessor for chemicals, Dr. Lewin worked at the Fraunhofer Institute for Toxicology and Experimental Medicine, Germany in GLP studies, developed alternative testing methods and new in-vivo/in vitro models.

Dr. Lewin was council member of the European Teratology Society, works as an independent consultant since 2014, is a European Registered Toxicologist (ERT) via the UK register for Toxicologists since 2016 and Member of the Royal Society of Biologists (MRSB) since 2018. She has published numerous articles on cardiac pharmacology, alternative methods in risk assessment and reproductive toxicology (pre- and postnatal development, juvenile toxicity in drug development).

Co-Founder, currently not contributing to consulting

Dr. Lars Mecklenburg studied veterinary medicine at the Veterinary School in Hannover, Germany. He achieved his PhD in pathology and is certified as a pathologist in Germany. In 2009, Dr. Mecklenburg became a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Pathologists (ACVP) and in 2012, he was certified as an Advanced Risk Assessor by the European TRISK program.

Dr. Mecklenburg worked as a toxicologic pathologist at ALTANA Pharma AG, headed preclinical program management at Nycomed GmbH, was Vice President for the Biorepository at Indivumed GmbH, and Vice President for Global Preclinical Development at Fresenius Kabi Deutschland. He worked as a consultant 2014-19, and has published numerous scientific articles in the fields of pathology, experimental dermatology, and preclinical drug development.

Dr. Antje Munder

Dr. Antje Munder studied veterinary medicine at the University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover. After a brief sidetrip into practical farm animal medicine, she did her doctorate in the field of gene therapy as a member of an European Graduate College at Hannover Medical School (MHH) and HZI Braunschweig.

She then started her postdoctoral career at MHH studying infection biology of bacterial pathogens in the hereditary disease of cystic fibrosis. Working in vitro and in vivo, she established and elaborated numerous infection models and investigated various aspects of bacterial pathogenicity. As a principal investigator, she more focused on innovative therapies for life-limiting lung diseases bringing gene and cell-based immuno therapies to bear. Dr. Munder has a long-standing expertise in experimental animal research, where she is doing trainings and gives lessons for young scientists. She co-authored around 30 peer-reviewed publications and acts as a scientific reviewer for several journals. Since 2023 Dr. Munder supports the team of PCS.

Merlin Rensing

Merlin Rensing finished his B.Sc. in biology at the Julius-Maximilians-University Würzburg with a focus on Immunology before moving to Sweden. There he was awarded a M.Sc. in Infection Biology at Uppsala University with a thesis focusing on autoimmune diseases at Karolinska Institutet. He worked two years as a researcher at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) in the field of chemical / genetic pathogenesis and communication in plants. Merlin started at the company in July 2021 to work on environmental risk assessments, whilst still working on his licentiate thesis in ecology at SLU.