On Wednesday, January 29th, we concluded our intensive 7-day PhD Candidate Course, bringing together early-career researchers from Gastroenterology, Endocrinology, and Metabolism. Over just under two weeks, six interdisciplinary teams collaborated to develop a 1,500-word research proposal and craft a compelling pitch to present their ideas.
This approach fosters innovative thinking and cross-disciplinary collaboration, leading to truly original research proposals. Both the best proposal and the best pitch were awarded separately—but for the first time, one team won both!
They skillfully applied the insights from the pitch workshop, winning over their peers, and impressed the AGEM research board with the quality of their proposal—securing the €5000 grant to bring their research to life.
A huge well done to all teams for the exceptional work they delivered in such a short time. We hope the skills they honed during this course will serve you throughout your research careers!
🏆 Prize winners
This year, the same group won both the Pitch and Proposal competitions. Congratulations to Group C, consisting of Marta Hanczar, Raya Geels, and Roberta Tandari.
Till next year!
From Wednesday January 17th till Wednesday January 24th, AGEM offered the AGEM PhD candidate course for the fourth time. This course aims to inform (starting) PhD-candidates about gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism, including those topics that are not necessarily within the scope of the PhD candidates own research. The course was coordinated by Annemieke Heijboer and Hilde Herrema and 15 teachers gave lectures during the course.
Wednesday through Friday of the first week, all participants were given an overview of general insights and methodology applicable to gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism in daily lectures with subjects ranging from the pathophysiology of intestinal diseases to organoids as model system for GI research, from transgender care to imaging techniques for insulin resistance, and from inborn errors of metabolism to macrophage metabolism.
During the course, eight interdisciplinary teams collaborated to develop a 1,500-word research proposal and craft a compelling pitch to present their ideas. All groups skillfully applied the insights they learned from thepitch workshop and pitched their proposals to all participants on the last day of the course.
This year, group D (Jarne Jermei, Tianqi Mu and Miriam van der Werf) gave the best pitch and group H (Karlijn Koops, Romy de Kroon and Han Jiao) wrote the best proposal.
In January of 2022, AGEM offered for the third time a course specifically developed for PhD-students that perform research in the field of gastroenterology, endocrinology and/or metabolism. This course aimed to inform (starting) PhD-candidates about gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism, including those topics that are not necessarily within the scope of the PhD-candidates own research. The course was coordinated by five AGEM members, Anje te Velde, Dries Kalsbeek, Sarah Siegelaar, Riekelt Houtkooper and Maarten Soeters, and more than 40 teachers gave lectures during the course.
The course ran for two weeks. In the first week, all participants were given an overview of general insights and methodology applicable to gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism in daily lectures with subjects ranging from the pathophysiology of oesophagal diseases from clinic to cell biology, to imaging techniques for insulin resistance, and from epigenetics, tomacrophage metabolism. The following week consisted of two parallel courses; (1) gastroenterology and (2) endocrinology and metabolism and discussed the matters in more depth.
At the beginning of the course the PhD-students were given an assignment in small groups of three or four students. During the course the PhD students wrote a multidisciplinary grant proposal that was, well-prepared by the pitch workshop given in the first week, pitched to all participants on the last day of the course
In January and February of 2021, after a successful first edition in 2020, AGEM offered for the second time a course specifically developed for PhD-students that perform research in the field of gastroenterology, endocrinology and/or metabolism. This course aims to inform (starting) PhD-candidates about gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism, including those topics that are not necessarily within the scope of the PhD-candidates’ own research. The course was coordinated by five AGEM members, Anje te Velde, Dries Kalsbeek, Sarah Siegelaar, Riekelt Houtkooper and Maarten Soeters, and more than 40 teachers gave lectures during the course.
Due to the COVID-19 regulations, the course was online via ZOOM and ran for two weeks. In the first week, all participants were given an overview of general insights and methodology applicable to gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism in daily lectures with subjects ranging from the pathophysiology of oesophagal diseases from clinic to cell biology, to imaging techniques for insulin resistance, and from epigenetics, to macrophage metabolism.
The following week consisted of two parallel courses; (1) gastroenterology and (2) endocrinology and metabolism and discussed the matters in more depth. At the beginning of the course the PhD-students were given an assignment in small groups of three or four students. During the course the PhD students wrote a multidisciplinary grant proposal that was, well-prepared by the pitch workshop given in the first week, pitched to all participants on the last day of the course. Judged by the course coordinators, Group G (Jeska Fritzsche, Maurice Kroon, Richie Goulding and Sophie Schaper) wrote the best grant proposal “Unravelling the etiology of sex differences in the intestinal microbiome: a role for the gonadal hormones?” and they were given the opportunity to perform the research proposed in their project.
In January of 2020, AGEM offered for the first time a course specifically developed for PhD-students that perform research in the field of gastroenterology, endocrinology and/or metabolism. This course aimed to inform (starting) PhD-candidates about gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism, including those topics that are not necessarily within the scope of the PhD-candidates own research. The course was coordinated by five AGEM members, Anje te Velde, Dries Kalsbeek, Sarah Siegelaar, Riekelt Houtkooper and Maarten Soeters, and more than 40 teachers gave lectures during the course.
The course runned for a week and a half. In the first week, all participants were given an overview of general insights and methodology applicable to gastroenterology, endocrinology and metabolism in daily lectures with subjects ranging from the pathophysiology of oesophagal diseases from clinic to cell biology, to imaging techniques for insulin resistance, and from epigenetics, to macrophage metabolism.
The following half week consisted of two parallel courses; (1) gastroenterology and (2) endocrinology and metabolism and discussed the matters in more depth.
At the beginning of the course the PhD-students were given an assignment in small groups of three or four students. During the course the PhD students wrote a multidisciplinary grant proposal that was, well-prepared by the pitch workshop given in the first week, pitched to all participants on the last day of the course.
The course ended with drinks and “bitterballen” in the bar The Box at the AMC.
Judged by the course coordinators, Group E (Dion Muller, Jelmer Jukema and Anne Linde Mak) wrote the best grant proposal and they were given the opportunity to perform the research proposed in their project. Voted by the audience, Group D (Chan, Habibe, de Jong and Pitotti) gave the best pitch and they received a candy bouquet for their great performance.