One Health PACT / Avans – Three Lab-students
Three 3rd year Biology and Laboratorial Research students are till the summer working on OHPACT-related projects within Avans under the supervision of teachers with OHPACT as their client in the minor bio-informatics. Within this part of the curriculum of the bachelor education, project based learning is essential. In collaboration with Erasmus MC (Bas Oudemunnink and Reina Sikkema), students are contributing to the species identification of ticks in the Netherlands. In association with Radboud (Tom van der Most), students are developing data-analysis pipeline to determine the presence of RNA viruses in mosquito samples.
Who are these students?
1. Joris Nollen
Who am I?
My name is Joris Nollen, and I am 26 years old. Currently, I am following a Bachelor of Biomedical Laboratory Research at Avans Hogeschool in Breda, the Netherlands. During my second semester, I will be following the minor Bioinformatics.
What subject will I be focussing on this semester? What will I be researching?
This semester, as part of my minor Bioinformatics, I will be working on a project focused on developing a streamlined pipeline for virus discovery in Illumina data obtained from mosquitos. Our project is part of a study (RadboudMC, Department of Medical Microbiology) that focuses on insect-specific viruses’ effect on the arbovirus transmission efficiency of mosquitoes (mainly Culex pipiens) in the Netherlands. During this project, I am working together with my project partner Veerle de Nijs.
What do I want to do with this in the future?
Thus far it is still unknown whI hope to be able to create pipelines adapted to the research I will be involved with in the future. I also hope this can contribute to the knowledge about the transmission of viruses by mosquitos.
What would I like to learn?
My interests lie mainly in genomic research. An essential aspect of this research is the processing of obtained data, of which I have only a little experience so far. Since bioinformatics plays a vital role in data processing today, I would like to get more familiar with bioinformatics because I am convinced that this aspect of genetic research has the most potential for further development and research.
You can find me on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/joris-nollen-869309227
2. Veerle de Nijs
Who am I?
My name is Veerle de Nijs, and I am 19 years old. I study biomedical laboratory research at Avans University of Applied Sciences. I am in my third year and following the minor Bioinformatics.
What subject will I be focussing on this semester? What will I be researching?
At the moment I am working on a project for my minor Bioinformatics. The main goal of this project is to develop a streamlined pipeline for virus detection from Illumina sequencing data from mosquitoes. Our project is a part of a study (RadboudMC, Department of Medical Microbiology, Experimental Virology group). Tom van der Most is the contact person during this project. It focuses on the effect of insect-specific viruses on the transmission of arboviruses by mosquitoes in the Netherlands. During this project, I am working together with my project partner Joris Nollen.
What do I want to do with this in the future?
Bioinformatics has a great future ahead of it and I hope that the knowledge gained from this project can be used by students working on One Healt Pact projects in the future. Because bioinformatics is becoming more and more important, I think that I can use the knowledge gained in this project for future research.
What would I like to learn?
I would really like to learn more about how to build a streamlined pipeline in order to gain more knowledge and improve my skills. I would also like to learn more about which viruses are common in mosquitoes now, to be better prepared for virus outbreaks in the future.
You can find me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/veerle-de-nijs-92a2b9232/
3. Rubiëla Rosalia
Who am I?
My name is Rubiëla Rosalia and I am a biomedical laboratory student at Avans University of applied science.
What subject will I be focussing on this semester? What will I be researching?
In correlation with One Health PACT, I will be working on thick species determination this semester. I will be reviewing various tick species known in the Netherlands, in comparison to those in the whole of Europe, and assessing sequence quality and gene variation. Furthermore, I will be assessing the quality of current primers as well as designing new universal and species-specific PCR primers for detection of Cytochrome c oxidase, 18S rRNA, and internal transcribed spacer 2.
What do I want to do with this in the future?
I think Bioinformatics is a key element in research studies regarding Microbiology. Therefore, I would like a job that requires a mixture of both. I enjoy working in both wet and dry labs and would like to strengthen my skills and knowledge in both fields.
What would I like to learn?
II look forward to learning about various programming tools such as Python, and how to apply them in the research field. In addition, I want to learn to read and analyse data. Last but not least I look forward to increase my skills and knowledge of genomics and proteomics.