Kirstine Kirkegaard
The Modern Laboratory · People
The Modern Laboratory
Kirstine Kirkegaard
She asked the careful questions every new technique deserves, and showed that time-lapse culture was safe for embryos.
A careful start. Kirstine Kirkegaard began her research at the Fertility Clinic of Aarhus University Hospital in Skejby, Denmark, working with Hans Jakob Ingerslev and colleagues. In 2012 she published a randomised trial asking a simple question first: is an incubator with a built-in camera safe? At two centres, 676 eggs from 59 patients were cultured either in a time-lapse incubator or in a conventional one. Embryos developed equally well in both, and pregnancy and implantation rates did not differ.
What timing can and cannot tell us. In 2013, in Human Reproduction, she followed 571 embryos from 92 women with a good outlook for treatment. Early timings, such as how long the first division took and how long the embryo stayed at three cells, predicted which embryos would become good blastocysts within the first 48 hours. Yet among 84 single embryo transfers, the timings of embryos that implanted did not differ from those that did not. She suggested that one universal timetable for every embryo might not exist, and that time-lapse might help most in setting aside embryos that divide abnormally.
A wider view. Her other time-lapse studies looked at embryos after a cell is removed for genetic testing, at the effect of oxygen levels, and at how much observers agree when they annotate the same films. In 2015 she compared choosing embryos by time-lapse with standard grading, and in 2016 she showed that embryo timing is shaped by the patient the embryo comes from.
Today. Her later research has turned to early ovarian ageing and to fertility treatment more broadly. She is a clinical associate professor at Aarhus University, at the Fertility Clinic of Horsens Regional Hospital. In 2024 she was named deputy head of a new university fertility clinic shared by Horsens and Skive.
About the sources
- Aarhus University staff page: Kirstine Kirkegaard, Clinical Associate Professor, ph.d., Department of Clinical Medicine, Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Horsens; opened 7 October 2026.
- Aarhus University, Faculty of Health, "Skive and Horsens to get a joint university fertility clinic", 27 June 2024.
- Kirkegaard K, Sundvall L, Erlandsen M, Hindkjær JJ, Knudsen UB, Ingerslev HJ. Timing of human preimplantation embryonic development is confounded by embryo origin. Human Reproduction 2016;31:324–331. PubMed 26637491.
- Kirkegaard K, Ahlström A, Ingerslev HJ, Hardarson T. Choosing the best embryo by time lapse versus standard morphology. Fertility and Sterility 2015;103:323–332. PubMed 25527231.
- Kirkegaard K, Agerholm IE, Ingerslev HJ. Time-lapse monitoring as a tool for clinical embryo assessment. Human Reproduction 2012;27:1277–1285. PubMed 22419744.
- Kirkegaard K, Kesmodel US, Hindkjær JJ, Ingerslev HJ. Time-lapse parameters as predictors of blastocyst development and pregnancy outcome in embryos from good prognosis patients: a prospective cohort study. Human Reproduction 2013;28(10):2643–2651. PubMed 23900207.
- Kirkegaard K, Hindkjaer JJ, Grøndahl ML, Kesmodel US, Ingerslev HJ. A randomized clinical trial comparing embryo culture in a conventional incubator with a time-lapse incubator. Journal of Assisted Reproduction and Genetics 2012;29(6):565–572. PubMed 22460082.
- Europe PMC author search, Kirkegaard K (Kirstine), 2012 to 2026, including Hum Reprod 2012;27:97–105 (blastomere removal), Fertil Steril 2013;99:738 (oxygen), Hum Reprod 2013;28:3215 (observer variability), and ovarian ageing papers 2020 to 2022.
The IVF Museum · The Modern Laboratory · People
Compiled with AI-assisted research and checked against the original sources. Not yet peer-reviewed. Corrections are warmly welcomed.
