An internationally recognised researcher in experimental medicine, Dr Tapmeier joined the Ritchie Centre in August 2020 to investigate endometriosis and uterine fibroids, conditions affecting millions of women. Symptoms include severe pain, abnormal uterine bleeding, infertility and miscarriages, and new avenues of diagnosis and treatment are urgently needed.

Dr Tapmeier completed his PhD in Transplantation Immunology on the “Role of CD4⁺ T cells in renal fibrosis” at King’s College London in 2009 and went to the University of Oxford for post-doctoral studies in cancer immunology funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) and Cancer Research UK (CRUK). Having improved upon the existing unilateral ureteric obstruction (UUO) model of kidney disease in mice while at King’s College London, he established an intravital imaging system at Oxford to observe vascular developments in murine tumours. He also researched novel pH-based diagnostic probes (pHLIP) in mouse models of breast cancer. 

In 2015, Dr Tapmeier joined the Oxford – Bayer Alliance for Women’s Health to research new avenues of treatment in endometriosis and uterine fibroids at the Endometriosis CaRe Centre within the Nuffield Department of Women’s & Reproductive Health. There, he wrote the protocol for a study into the biology of uterine fibroids and endometriosis, the “Fibroids and Endometriosis Oxford” (FENOX) study (2018 – 2028, ISRCTN 13560263). His research into exosomes within peritoneal fluid was presented at the 13^th World Congress on Endometriosis (WCE) 2017 in Vancouver and is the subject of his DPhil student’s thesis at Oxford, Dr Hannah Nazri.

In 2019, Dr Tapmeier relocated to the ANU at Canberra as an Honorary Lecturer in Cancer Biology and joined the ANU’s COVID-19 response as a volunteer from March 2020 onwards.

Dr Tapmeier won the Sarah Agboolah Studentship for his PhD studies in London, travel bursaries from Amgen to attend the Renal Week meetings, and funding for lab exchanges with TcLand in Nantes, France (KCL, UK) and with Bayer AG in Berlin, Germany (MRC, UK). He won a grant for his research into exosomes from the Medical Sciences Division of the University of Oxford, and an industry collaborative grant from the Oxford – Bayer Alliance to lead the investigation into angiogenesis mechanisms in uterine fibroids. He is named as contributor to IP and patents within the Alliance. 

He is a member of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE) and a reviewer for Fertility & Sterility, the Journal of Extracellular Vesicles, for Experimental and Molecular Pathology, and for the Journal of Translational Medicine.