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22 april 2008
The KNAW has selected four new Academy Professors this year. They are Professor H.R. (Harry) Büller, Professor Ben Feringa, Professor Frank Grosveld and Professor Pierre de Wit.
As Academy Professors they will be able to devote themselves full-time to innovative research and the supervision of young researchers. Academy Professors are released by their universities from administrative obligations. The Academy professorship is being awarded for a period of five years. For each Academy Professor the KNAW is making EUR 1 million available for this purpose.
Professor H.R. (Harry) Büller has been awarded an Academy Professorship for his work as a pre-eminent clinical investigator in the field of thrombosis research over the last thirty years. He has made important contributions to aetiology, prevention, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis of venous and arterial thrombotic diseases. Büller has developed methods for clinical trials which now are regarded as the gold standard in the field. His studies pioneered the use of important non-invasive diagnostic tests to assess deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism, and fundamentally changed the treatment regime with the evaluation of antithrombotic agents. Büller s work has brought together clinicians and scientists. His publications are highly regarded by his peers and frequently referred to as primary articles in the field. He has supervised many PhD students who now themselves have solid international research reputations, and several of whom have already attained professorships. Büller is considered a main player in his field, and has the reputation of being able to lead, inspire and support his colleagues, and has attracted large financial resources to support clinical trials. Expectations of his future research and further contributions to the next generation of researchers are high, and it is hoped and expected that they will be greatly assisted by the award of an Academy Professorship.
Professor B.L. (Ben) Feringa has been awarded an Academy Professorship for his groundbreaking work in chemistry. He is the world leader in the synthesis of organic molecules that function as molecular motors. Feringa was the first to synthesise molecular motors that can be stimulated with light to rotate continuously. He did so using a very imaginative approach in synthetic organic chemistry. His peers consider this to be one of the finest pieces of chemistry. He has also made many important and original contributions in organic synthesis in other fields such as molecular solar cells and asymmetric catalysis. Worldwide recognition of his work is demonstrated by the numerous international prizes he has received, the large number of citations of his work, and in the fact that he is in high demand as speaker at international conferences. His former PhD students are much sought after by industry, and he has attracted excellent post-doctoral researchers from all over the world, many of whom have since reached high positions at esteemed universities abroad. Feringa is still a very active force in research. The field can greatly benefit from new breakthroughs, which, based on Feringa s earlier work could very well lead to practical applications in fields like biology and medicine and various kinds of sensor devices.
Professor F.G. (Frank) Grosveld has been awarded an Academy Professorship in recognition of superlative and unrivalled studies into the regulation of gene expression over thirty years. In his post-doctoral research he constructed the first reliable method for cloning human DNA cosmids - at the time an extremely difficult but rewarding accomplishment that has since been adopted by many other laboratories. By using the globin gene cluster he made the ground-breaking discovery of a locus control region located upstream of the gene itself and governing overall control of globin gene expression. After this first report, locus control regions have now been identified for many genes and have permitted for example the ectopic expression of genes in transgenic mice. In further studies he identified chromatin loops and the hubs that hold the loops together. His more recent excursions into erythroid differentiation have made the key identifications of the transcription factor GATA1, a major and unique advance into understanding erythroid cell development. Along with major research advances he has also developed new technologies, such as 3C and 4C technology that makes possible examination of chromatin conformation on a chip and constructed a number of spin off companies. Grosveld holds 21 patents. At the incredibly early age of 43 he was awarded the Louis-Jeantet Prize and was elected to the Royal Society of London for his achievements in unravelling transcriptional regulation. His research is a symbol of what can be achieved in gene regulation. He has always maintained a very large group of active young scientists, many of whom have gone on to academic positions all over the world and are now eminent scientists leading groups of their own. His numerous publications which appear in the highest impact journals Cell, Nature, Science and EMBO Journal record an exemplary publication achievement that few others have managed.
Professor P.J.G.M. (Pierre) de Wit has been awarded an Academy Professorship for his major contributions to molecular plant pathology and plant microbe interactions. He is recognised as a pioneer of this particular field and his early groundbreaking studies did much to energise the whole field of molecular study of disease in plants, which is now regarded as one of the three major areas of research in plant biology. He cloned the first avirulence gene in plants to the disease fungus Cladosporium fulvum and thus set the scene for others to follow. He has also studied the fungal effectors that are responsible for disease recognition by the attached plant and identified both a cysteine protease and a chitin binding protein which are now considered to be effective receptors for fungal effectors. He was recently awarded the Noel Keen prize by the American Society of Plant Patholology in recognition of his achievements in enormously advancing knowledge of plant disease over many years. He has been elected chairman of the primary international organisation Molecular Plant Microbe Interactions that organises the major meetings on plant disease. De Wit is known to be an excellent scientific diplomat and, by constructing numerous European networks, he has raised large sums of grant money for disease investigation. He attracts a large number of students, and several of his former students have obtained prestigious scientific positions.
The Academy Professorship programme has two aims. Firstly, senior scientists between 54 and 59 years of age are released entirely from administrative and management tasks for a period of five years at the end of their careers. This enables them to devote all their time to doing innovative research and to training young researchers. Secondly, new research leaders are appointed to replace the Academy Professors in the same or similar fields of science or scholarship. The Academy's total contribution to an Academy Professorship amounts to EUR 1.000.000. Nominations for Academy Professors are assessed by an international assessment committee, which comprises members of foreign academies or scientists and scholars of comparable stature.
More information on the Programme and the appointed Academy Professors can be found on the website.
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