Team:TU Eindhoven/Team
The Team
Team members
Name: Jeroen Deckers Function: Team Manager Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Biology Age: 21
I am proud to be called the team manager of this year's enthusiastic team and I am sure that we will yield great results. I will be keeping track of and contribute to every little part of the project and make sure that all the separate parts are integrated into one coherent project. Further, I will be responsible for keeping us all facing the same direction and will make sure that everyone keeps enjoying working on the project. Our road to Boston will be paved with deadlines and hard work but it promises to be a journey filled with loads of fun.
Name: Yvonne van Mil Function: Secretary & Public Relations Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Bio-Organic Chemistry Age: 23
After following the iGEM process of the TU/e team last year, I thought it would be a great experience to participate in the competition this year myself. This because I want to broaden my experience in the lab for my own graduation research, and together with developing my communication skills, iGEM will be the best and most fun option to do so. By being a secretary and taking care of personal relations, together with performing experiments in the lab, I think iGEM will be a year with great challenges and a lot of learning opportunities.
Name: Jo-Anne Ewald Function: Finance Manager Program: BSc. Medical Sciences and Technology Age: 19
Something I love doing is sports such as running a marathon or participating in a triathlon, where perseverance is a necessity. I believe that the sky is the limit and no challenge is too much. That is the reason why I want to be part of the iGEM team. It’s a multidisciplinary team where we can come up with challenges ourselves, something which naturally suits me. Moreover, I think my perseverance can really help in the lab when things don't go as planned. Something else I love to do is traveling, because you can meet different people and cultures all over the world. Therefore, human practices and acquisition are things I like to do and want to contribute to.
Name: Noëlle Gerards Function: Sponsor Coordinator Program: BSc. Biomedical Technology Age: 20
I’m a second-year bachelor student in Biomedical Technology and my main interests lay in the technical aspects of our program. I joined the iGEM team as I wanted to gain more soft skills and experience in the field of synthetic biology through an opportunity like this. In our team, I will be responsible for the sponsoring work. Additionally, I will contribute to the lab work and join the human practices team. I am here to do the research needed to get our project where we want it to be!
Name: Mandy Shao Function: Sponsor Coordinator Program: BSc. Biomedical Technology Age: 22
I believe that being a part of the iGEM team is a challenging opportunity for personal and educational development because we get the chance to freely develop and plan our own innovative scientific project. It is very thrilling to attend the iGEM competition which will give us the insight of endless possibilities that synthetic biology has to offer the world. Within this team, I am very proud of setting up the Sponsoring of our team and I am eager to learn more. I am also part of the Fundraising, Lab and Human Practices team. Not to mention the excitement I have, to contribute wherever I am needed so we can bring our project to life.
Name: Eva Hanckmann Function: Lab Captain & Human Practices Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Protein Engineering Age: 22
I am part of the group of Protein Engineering, where we are busy with many different protein-related subjects including point of care testing and BRET. The subject of our project is therefore completely in my field of interest. In the iGEM team, I will be mostly working in the lab where I hope to improve my lab skills. I will also be keeping myself busy with human practices. I like to work in a team, and with my work in the iGEM team, I want to improve my soft skills and learn more about synthetic biology.
Name: Harm van der Veer Function: Lab Captain & Human Practices Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Chemical Biology Age: 22
I’m fascinated by nature, down to its smallest scales, as chemical biology is all about. I find it simply wonderful how, in a cell, all the molecular players and little biochemical machines act together in an overwhelmingly complex, yet amazingly clever concert to make life be. As an engineering student, I fancy tweaking or even designing such biological systems, thereby aiming to offer solutions the world desperately needs. I’m this vegan idealist who wants to help make the world a better place. I like to question preconceptions and push boundaries (in fact, I do so every single day, crossing the Belgian-Dutch border on my way to Eindhoven 😉). In this project, we will make use of bacteriophages, again ingenious products of natural evolution, but not that well-known yet(!) in the western world. I am excited to travel around interviewing experts on all sorts of technical, but also societal aspects of our project, next to experimenting in the lab, delving into literature and finding ways to overcome hurdles on our way to Boston.
Name: Claire Michielsen Function: Lab Captain Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Protein Engineering Age: 22
I am specializing in the fascinating field of protein engineering. iGEM gives me the opportunity to experience doing my own research and to evolve many other skills. As lab captain, I will be mostly focusing on the planning and execution of the lab work for our project. I am also helping with finding sponsors, so we have the funding to reach our goal. I am enthusiastic and curious about our project and cannot wait to see how far we will come!
Name: Anouk Marinus Function: Wiki Captain & Website Program: MSc. Medical Engineering, Imaging Age: 22
In my studies, I’m mostly focusing on image analysis. However, of course, I think the field of synthetic biology is very interesting as well. In this team, I will be responsible for the wiki and the website. With these tasks, I can use and hopefully further develop my programming skills. In addition, I will work on human practices and together with some lab work and the more general teamwork I want to broaden my skill set.
Name: Roy van Mierlo Function: Modelling Captain Program: MSc. Biomedical Engineering, Computational Biology Age: 23
I’m a 2nd-year master student in Computational Biology and am thus currently learning all about machine learning and statistics. However, next to that I also gained lab experience from my previous year when I was in the group of Protein Engineering. In our project, I’ll mainly be doing the programming, but since I also know my way around in the lab, starting with iGEM seemed like a great opportunity to me since I’d be able to combine these two worlds into one project. It’s also great to be able to gain some soft skills and broaden my knowledge about synthetic biology while we are building our own project from the ground up.
Name: Chris Tomassen Function: Designer Program: MSc. Innovation Management Age: 24
Being an innovator by heart and designer by Bachelor, I like to think in concepts and visualizations. That’s why I love prototyping ideas with the laser cutter and 3D printer. Having little experience in medical engineering requires me to learn, simplify and visualize specialized knowledge through a new perspective. This new context makes iGEM the perfect opportunity for me to improve my storytelling, prototyping, and graphic design. Besides all, I love the challenge of immersing myself in a new industry through the dynamics of working in a multi-disciplinary team!
Advisors
Ir. Eva van Aalen
This year I have the honor of supervising the IGEM team in the lab. I am a PhD student in the Protein Engineering group and Microsystems group at the TU/e and am specializing in bioluminescent protein sensors for POC testing. I am trying to make microfluidic chips to selectively detect analytes in blood samples. It is great to see the enthusiasm of this team of young researchers and am sure they will achieve great things this year!
Supervisors
Prof. dr. M. (Maarten) Merkx
Maarten Merkx is full professor at the department of Biomedical Engineering of Eindhoven University of Techology (TU/e), where he leads the research group Protein Engineering operating at the interface of chemical biology and synthetic biology. An important research theme is to develop generic engineering concepts for the development of protein-based switches, which include fluorescent sensors for intracellular imaging of metal ions, photo-switchable proteins, and protein-based sensors for antibody detection. Combining protein engineering and DNA nanotechnology the group develops intelligent biomolecular sensors and switches for applications in intracellular imaging, optogenetics, point-of-care diagnostics and antibody-based therapies.
Because of his experience in point-of-care diagnostics, Maarten Merkx had the biggest connection to our team and our project. He helped a lot in the whole process in the lab and came with great ideas to bring our project to the next level. His latest discovery of NanoLuc-mNeonGreen fits in perfectly with our system and we are grateful that we could make use of that.
Prof. dr. ir. L. (Luc) Brunsveld
Luc Brunsveld is professor of Chemical Biology at the department of Biomedical Engineering. His research interests are focused on chemical biology approaches studying protein-protein interactions, particularly drug discovery and supramolecular signaling systems. Combining synthetic and supramolecular chemistry with chemical biology allows exact molecular modulation of biological systems.
For our iGEM team Luc Brunsveld mostly helped us with his critical look on our project. He is very perceptive, which helped us in troubleshooting our project. Also, he had solutions for the phage experiments that were not permitted in our lab in Eindhoven and he shared some contacts for sponsoring.
Dr. ir. T.F.A. (Tom) de Greef
Tom de Greef is Associate Professor of Synthetic Biology in the department of Biomedical Engineering. Work in the Synthetic Biology group is directed at the bottom-up construction of basic cellular functions from well-characterized biological components, and the development of novel biological computing devices that can enhance signal-processing capabilities of natural and synthetic cells.
Tom de Greef has helped us in making connections. He always knew the right person who could help us if we countered a problem, mostly model related. Also he came up with the idea to use Gibson assembly because of his expertise in DNA assembly.
