Marine Biologist | Project Coordinator at SeaQurrentSince September 2023, my career has taken an exciting turn towards marine biology at SeaQurrent, where I've had the privilege of leading ecological projects. This shift has been made possible by my solid foundation in Applied Biology and a research experience gained as a scientist at HZPC.My journey into the world of marine biology has been enriched by my private engagement in nature projects at Waddenzee and Ameland. These experiences have not only broadened my perspective but have also initiated a strong commitment to environmental conservation and blue energy. In my current role, I am responsible for coordinating ecological projects, with a primary focus on monitoring the environment around the TidalKite. Together with my colleagues, we are dedicated to collecting the data, enhancing measurement techniques, and developing effective mitigation plans.Key Responsibilities- Utilizing various techniques and measuring devices such as underwater sound measurements, sonar, ADCP's, and receivers for the detection of tagged animals.- Stakeholder engagement, ensuring effective communication and collaboration.- Reporting and documentation of project progress and findings.- Cooperation with external research institutes and companies to enhance project outcomes.- Guiding permits and licenses to ensure compliance with regulations.My role at SeaQurrent enables me to combine my scientific expertise with project management skills to lead the ecological challenges, particularly in the domain of blue energy and tidal energy. My contribution to sustainable solutions creates a balance between technological innovation and environmental preservation, especially in the dynamic field of marine renewable energy. I am committed to playing a role in advancing blue energy technologies that not only meet our energy needs but also respect and protect our marine ecosystems.

Driven by my commitment to sustainable energy solutions, I am proud to be part of the SeaQurrent team. The Team, that's on the mission to harness the tidal energy and deliver electricity to the local households. Key-responsibilities:+ Collaboration with experts in engineering, procurement, and mechanics to ensure the highest standards of sustainability and efficiency.+ Implementation of the data-driven project management methodologies and documents.+ Successful project launches and execution.+ Resource optimization and budget control.+ Proactively identified potential project risks.+ Leading and motivating project Teams.+ Cultivation of the relationships with stakeholders, including government agencies, investors, and local communities.

As a Team Leader OP-MB I was looking for the balance between innovation, continues improvement and safe, friendly work environment for the analysts and lab-assistants from my Team. Main responsibilities include:  client communication receiving and coordinating requests into year planning handling (accepting or rejecting) of additional ad-hoc requests managing the protocols – administrative and executive  creating SOP’s for the wet-lab  supervising data analysis and quality checks  key-user and test coordinator for OP applications like LIMS and scoring scripts making the yearly budget and reporting it to a manager making pricing agreements with suppliers, controlling the orders and managing invoices coaching team members and keeping good work-home balance

Within this position at HZPC I was working as a manager for my own projects as well as team member in research that required the expertise and knowledge of various disciplines I have designed, performed and managed the research and development of various valuable markers that are currently being employed on potato seedlings to allow screening of these phenotypes in early stages of potato breeding. The value of these markers is not being limited to breeding strategies but also reduced the time, costs and available greenhouse space which allowed an increased number of potato crossings per year. Furthermore, I used a variety of molecular biology techniques, from plant genotyping (HRM, KASP, Allelic Discrimination TaqMan), real-time and end-point PCR to Sanger sequencing, NGS, WGS and RNAseq. I performed data analyses, with a great support of bioinformaticians team. Other functions I was to manage the rebuilding and re-organization of our laboratory including structural and procedural developments to facilitate a more systematic workflow. This partly included the implementation of robotics and automation within our laboratory. Searching for new innovations and negotiating contracts enabled me to develop business skills and interest.

My first assignment at HZPC was based on a project founded by the Carbohydrate Competence Center. Within this I was working on the modulation of potato starch to obtain a dietary fiber with prebiotic effects and low glycemic response. The clinical studies of the digestibility of high-amylose starch tested in the TIM-systems validated the concept that potato products high in amylose will lower the glycaemic response. My main responsibly in in this project was to set up the whole platform to rapidly screen potato plants for mutations in two Starch Branching Enzyme genes. This involved the design, optimization and validation of various molecular technics such as large scale RNA-, DNA-extraction, (RT-)PCR, TILLING, high resolution melting and sequencing.