ACS provides funds to support talented ACS researchers and to stimulate collaboration between ACS researchers within Amsterdam UMC. Each year several calls are organized for ACS researchers at different stages of their careers.

Each year, ACS organizes grant rounds for the Postdoc grant, MD/PhD grant and the Out of the Box (OOTB) grant. The Postdoc and MD/PhD grants are for excellent young basic and clinical researchers, respectively, and aim to support talented ACS researchers. The Postdoc grant provides the opportunity to obtain postdoc experience for a period of one year in a prestigious research center abroad. The MD/PhD grant covers one day a week protected research time for a two-year post-doctoral project for medical specialists in training. The OOTB grant aims at supporting ACS project leaders to set up new collaborations within ACS. For more information on the different grants, see the overview of ACS grants.

Two laureates tell what the ACS grant has brought them.

Barbara Verhaar - ACS Postdoc grant 2024

The ACS Talent Grant 2024 enabled me to further develop my research on host-microbe interactions in cardiovascular disease at Amsterdam UMC. I focused on identifying microbial salt resistace genes in gut metagenomic data from the HELIUS cohort, in collaboration with several Principal Investigators within ACS. During this project, I strengthened my bioinformatics skills and built a new pipeline to profile these genes at scale. This led to preliminary findings showing that a higher abundance of certain salt resistance genes is associated with lower blood pressure. These results formed a key part of my successful NWO Veni application and helped shape my independent research line. The grant also gave me the opportunity to expand my network within ACS, laying the groundwork for future interdisciplinary collaborations.

Ronak Delewi – ACS MD/PhD grant 2016

During my residency in Cardiology at the AMC, I remained captivated by cardiovascular research in the hope of improving clinical outcomes on a larger scale. Although I am a devoted physician, I missed having dedicated research time. As such, this ACS MD/PhD grant provided the perfect combination for my last years of training. I spent this time performing research in the field of transcatheter aortic valve implantation, supervising PhD students and also set up new research ideas and grants. It truly was the foundation for the future, where I will hopefully be able to further combine the love for research and interventional cardiology.