University of Groningen Revealing the genetic roots of obesity and type 2 diabetes Vliet-Ostaptchouk, Jana Vladimirovna van IMPORTANT NOTE: You are advised to consult the publisher's version (publisher's PDF) if you wish to cite from it. Please check the document version below. Document Version Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Publication date: 2010 Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database Citation for published version (APA): Vliet-Ostaptchouk, J. V. V. (2010). Revealing the genetic roots of obesity and type 2 diabetes. s.n. Copyright Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons). Take-down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Downloaded from the University of Groningen/UMCG research database (Pure): http://www.rug.nl/research/portal. For technical reasons the number of authors shown on this cover page is limited to 10 maximum. Download date: 23-09-2021 Acknowledgments The prelude to this thesis started long time ago after seeing a small announcement for a new course in Genetics on a message board at the school where I was deeply studying… Math and Physics. The topic looked so fascinating and challenging to me, that I immediately decided to subscribe for the course, and genetics became my ‘big’ topic of interest ever since. Today, this long journey reached a landmark. Certainly, this dissertation would not have been possible without the support and help from many people in many different ways, and now it’s time to thank all those who supported me during some stage in this process. First and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude to my promoters, Marten Hofker and Cisca Wijmenga. Dear Marten, I am very grateful for the opportunity you gave to me to return to science – first to work as a volunteer. Ever since this moment you have been supporting me and allowed me to grow and develop as a scientist. Because of your guidance I have learned the major scientific ‘rules of thumb’: whether it is about how to approach a scientific problem and to ask critical questions or whether it is about making the right choices for a career. And thanks a lot for teaching me to see the opportunities, to focus on one topic instead of spreading my attention on too many of them and for pushing me to be persistent to reach my goals. Dear Cisca, it was a great pleasure and a big challenge to be your PhD student! Thank you for all your valuable comments and encouraging advices, for your critical questions which often stimulated me to think “outside the box”, for -almost- always having time to answer any of my questions. I greatly admire your efficiency, your decision-making skills and your ability to solve problems. They are great examples of skills for me to achieve. Also I would like to express my gratitude to Prof. A.K. Groen, Prof. H. Snieder and Prof. Y.T. van der Schouw for being a member of the reading committee of my thesis. Next, it should be recognized that part of the success of this thesis was due to the Acknowledgements 155 cooperation and collaboration of the members from our “IOP” group. It was a great pleasure to be part of such excellent team of colleagues First, I would like to express my sincerely thanks to Prof. G.J.B. van Ommen and other members of our “Begeleidingscommissie (BC)” for their support and for their helpful and positive feedback on our research (and also for being patient with our habits to send the abstracts just before the submission deadlines). Dear Annelies and Tonnie, thank you for your kind help and support of our group. I deeply appreciate the contacts with the team from Utrecht University. Dear Yvonne, thank your for your advices, very helpful insights, friendly comments and good humour. Dear Timon, your wide knowledge of the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes was a great support for me, I appreciated a lot your contribution to all our manuscripts and also our discussions during the NVDO meetings. Dear Charlotte, I have learned a lot about statistical analysis from you, thanks for all your constructive comments and help during the preparation of the original articles. Dear Clara, it was great to meet you during this project, you since have became a dear friend. During these four years we had a lot of inspiring and brainstorming scientific discussions and warm private talks. Sterkte with finishing your thesis and moving to America (a lot of success to you and Bart there)! Dear Florianne, it was nice to work with you, good luck with finishing your PhD! Paul, during these few months you stepped in, your expertise and fresh ideas, as well as speedy way of working and your wide network contribute a lot to our CardioChip project. I would also warmly thank my colleagues from Maastricht University for our fine collaboration. Dear Prof. Buurman, dear Wim, your insightful remarks and your constructive criticism have always initiated interesting scientific discussions during our IOP meetings. Also it was a big pleasure to have short chitchats with you in Russian. Dear Sander, thank you for all your help and fast replies to any of my questions, your enthusiasm for our collaborative project was encouraging. Next, I like to thank all my present colleagues from Molecular Genetics. Three years ago I moved to Groningen and I was warmly welcomed here by my new colleagues. Dear Elinda and Niels, it was very-very empty in the lab then. Thanks for all the great job you did and efforts you made to organize the labs! Elinda, good luck at your new job! Dear Marijke, my heartiest thanks to you to step in and becoming my paranimfe. Your help and your words “Everything will be OK!” during these last hectic weeks of finishing the thesis were highly appreciated! Dear Ingrid, thanks for your indispensable help with dealing with all administration and bureaucratic matters, for keeping track on the deadlines and for always having time to just listen and to help! Dear Bart and Acknowledgements Debby, it is a great pleasure to have you as my colleagues, thank you for your scientific 156 (and not only) feedbacks to any of my questions. Dear Marcel, I was glad to finally have a ‘genetic’ buddy among our ‘mouse’ people with whom it became possible to discuss a new publication in Nature or the problems with DNA isolation. Dear Pascal, thanks a lot for your help with sending these 50 letters! A lot of success for your own promotion and research! Dear Anouk and Marcela, although we focused on totally different topics of research we could always talk, about all kinds of things. New AIO’s - Fareeba, Nanda, Paulina and Tobias - it was a pleasure to share the ‘AIO’- room with you. I like to wish you all a lot of success with your PhD research! Dear Daphne, Henk and Nicolette, it’s very nice to have such nice and friendly colleagues. Also, I would like to thank here Ron Korstanje and Lottie for all their help on different issues during that period when I was travelling between Groningen and Maastricht. Your help was a big support during that crazy period! Elena, it was a special time when three of us (you, me and our dearest Giuseppe who passed away so unexpectedly) were sharing the room and had lots of fun and interesting conversations. Good luck with finishing your thesis and passing your exams! Next, I like to warmly thank my colleagues at Medical Genetics. Dear Jackie, I am tremendously grateful for all the time you have spent on editing and correcting our manuscripts! It’s always a great pleasure to talk to you and to have your friendly advice on scientific or every day life issues. Dear Agatha, Asia, Gosja, Jihane, and Noortje, it’s absolutely cool to work with you! Not only because I know that I can rely on your help, whether it’s about finding master mix that finished, or problems with data extraction from a large ped-file, but also because of all our talks about everything and of having a lot of fun together in Groningen, Rolduc, Barcelona, and Cambridge Dear Dineke and Monique, thanks for your help and your advice during my first in situ rounds in Groningen. Dear Cleo, thanks for your help with the DNA and with the analysis, our KCNQ1 paper on its way. Dear Lude, your enthusiasm about research and your interests made our conversations inspiring and very challenging. Dear Jingyuan, your comments and remarks during the EPI meetings were always very helpful. Also, many thanks to Marcel, Mathieu, Elvira (an amazing woman who passed away so young!), Ron and Pieter for all their kind help in the lab. Also, I want to express my sincere gratitude to all my ex-colleagues at Maastricht University. During the period I have been working with you I learned a lot about my new country and its people. First of all, I am most grateful to Ronit. Dear Ronit, with the great appreciation I like to thank you for all what you have done for me! From Acknowledgements 157 the beginning you had complete trust in my potentials and motivations, your generous support and great encouragement played a very important role in my first steps after returning to science.