Gerrit earned his Bachelor's degree in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from the University of Applied Sciences Cologne, Germany, followed by a Master's in Toxicology at Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. For his doctoral research at the IUF – Leibniz Research Institute for Environmental Medicine, Düsseldorf, he investigated the lung toxicity of Saharan dust. He is currently studying the molecular signalling pathways linking ambient air pollution in the lung to pulmonary hypertension at the Center for Biological Research Margarita Salas.