TANDEM Member Prof Cisca Wijmenga awarded highest Dutch award in science
Prof Cisca Wijmenga
Credits: NWO/Ivar Pel
TANDEM Member Prof Cisca Wijmenga awarded highest Dutch award in science
Human genetics professor Cisca Wijmenga, principal investigator of TANDEM partner site UMCG (University Medical Center Groningen) will receive the 2015 NWO Spinoza Prize, the most prestigious science award in the Netherlands, for her outstanding work on the genetics of celiac disease. The prize is awarded each year to Dutch researchers who rank among the absolute top of science and it is considered to be “the Dutch Nobel Prize”. NWO Spinoza Prize laureates perform groundbreaking and high-impact research and are an inspiration for young researchers.
Cisca Wijmenga was nominated by the rector of the University of Groningen and the chairperson of the Dutch Network of Women Professors. The prize comes with a funding of 2.5 million EUR to be spent scientific research.
Prof Wijmenga is a leading researcher, both nationally and internationally, in the area of complex genetics and in particular the genetic risk factors that play a role in celiac disease, a chronic intestinal disorder. She identified this disease’s risk genes and also developed a reliable, simple and cost-effective method of testing for these risk genes. As a result, patients and doctors can take preventive action and start treatment for the disease at an early stage.
Cisca Wijmenga conducted similar research on genetic defects in type-2-diabetes and leukaemia. Her work is highly interdisciplinary in nature, by successfully combining insights from molecular genetics, immunology, epidemiology and bioinformatics. In 2006, she was one of the pioneers to chart the whole human genome (genome-wide association studies), in order to identify genetic risk factors for different diseases. That led to the groundbreaking insight that there is a genetic overlap between celiac disease and other autoimmune diseases. Cisca Wijmenga stressed the importance of identifying genes for individual diseases and is pre-eminent in this field.
In addition to being an internationally renowned scientist, Cisca is also an accomplished and skilled ambassador of science, who likes to disseminate her insights to the public at large. For the Noorderzon Performing Arts Festival in Groningen, she and her team of ‘DNA crunchers’ developed the successful DNA bar, where visitors could isolate their DNA and take it home with them in a pendant.
The TANDEM consortium is proud to benefit from Cisca’s expertise and congratulates her on this outstanding achievement!