Herman Wijffels Innovatieprijs 2012 - In Ovo - publieksprijs

In Ovo genomineerd voor de Herman Wijffels Innovatieprijs 2012

Wil

In Ovo is genomineerd voor de Herman Wijffels Innovatieprijs 2012! Toen we dit hoorden waren we zeer verrast en dolblij, want er zijn maar liefst 577 inzendingen ontvangen en wij behoren tot de laatste tien. Onze inzending betreft onze diervriendelijk en duurzame innovatie voor de pluimveeindustrie: In Ovo ontwikkelt een test waarmee het geslacht van kuikens al in het ei bepaald kan worden. Hiermee kan voorkomen worden dat alleen al in Nederland 45 miljoen kuikens op de dag van uitkomen gedood worden. Dit zijn de haantjes, zullen nooit eieren leggen en zijn dan ook nutteloos voor de eiproductie.

Nu worden de kuikens direct na uitkomen handmatig gesorteerd op geslacht. Dit proces levert de kuikens veel stress op. Met de test van In Ovo kan in de toekomst het geslacht van een kuiken al in het ei bepaald worden. Hiermee wordt de diervriendelijkheid van broederijen aanzienlijk verhoogd, aangezien er geen kuikens meer gedood hoeven te worden. Read More

Got it!

Wil

LUMC Student Research Award - bronzen veerLast Wednesday, to everyone’s surprise (especially mine), I won the LUMC Student Research Award 2012! This prize is awarded to the student who performed the best research internship. When your internship’s grade is high enough, you are invited to send in your report to a jury. They nominate three candidates and select a winner.

The award includes a bronze statue and a small grant. They misspelled my first name, but that’s no biggie. Just really happy and proud I won this one, and don’t let anyone say that studying as long as you can is a bad thing… 😉

LUMC

LUMC Student Research Award

Wil

I’m still having a hard time believing it, but I’m nominated for the LUMC Student Research Awards. This prize is awarded to two students, one from biomedical sciences and one from medicine, who performed the best research during the previous year.

Because of the nice result of my master’s first internship at the department of Molecular Cell Biology, section Electron Microscopy, I was invited to send in my report. There were five other candidates, but only three were nominated. The award includes a grant of €2,500 which you can spend on courses, books or a visit to a congress.

The award ceremony is this Wednesday in the LUMC and I’m really curious to see who’ll win.

Graduated

Wil

Finally. It took me about ten years to finish my studies, but it has happened: I graduated last April. Yes, ten years is a pretty long time, but I don’t regret a single moment. Why? Because studying is only one part of being a student. There’s a whole world outside of the university that you simply can’t ignore. I’m pretty sure I’ve learned at least as much studying biomedical subjects as exploring new opportunities while taking on all sorts of extra curricular activities. The trick is to do stuff and have fun!

I did my last internship at the startup in which I’m currently a partner. During these five months I learned a great deal about collecting market information and doing a market analysis. Together with my fellow founder, we visited a lot of people to build a strong network, acquire the required knowledge about companies in the poultry industry and to look for big piles of money to get our research started.

Currently we have a pretty strong position and are about to file for a patent. The fact that we were/are student-entrepreneurs worked in our advantage. I’m confident that we will be successful and yes, that does require a hell of a lot of work.