Team
Green Labs NL was founded in 2021 by members of the Dutch Scientific community with a passion for sustainability. The people that run Green Labs NL do this next to their own jobs. Scroll down to meet the team!
Hannah Johnson
Hey, my name is Hannah and I work as a lab manager and technician at the Princess Máxima Center in Utrecht. My team focuses on using advanced imaging techniques to Visualise the Unexpected! The natural beauty of the world is a great love of mine so trying to maintain it by reducing my footprint on the planet is a constant goal in my private life. I often feel at odds with how this plays out at work however, so getting involved with Green labs NL was a no brainer for me. We want to save lives and be healthy, so lets make sure we have a healthy, beautiful planet to do it on!
Florijn Dekkers
What inspires me most is the beauty of nature. I am a senior postdoc and part of the Green Labs Initiative at the Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology. Embedded in the DREAM3DLAB, my work focusses on developing advanced 3D imaging technologies to better understand and tackle the aggressive nature of cancer. Like many of us working in science, I feel a great urge to perform my work with a minimal impact on the environment and I am therefore excited to build a community that strives to create a world where science is green.
Lucia Giannini
Hi there! I am a medical doctor and PhD student at the department of Neurology of the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam. In my PhD project, I study pathological mechanisms underlying a specific form of dementia. As an individual, I feel that we should care for the health of our planet as much as we care for our own health. As a doctor, I believe that we cannot take our health for granted if we keep living in an increasingly unhealthy planet. The way forward is to take responsibility for the health of our planet – for ourselves, our communities and the entire natural world! That’s why I strive, in my daily life and in my work as a researcher, to act sustainably and to advocate for sustainable change. With Green Labs NL, I hope to reach out to a growing network of sustainability-minded scientists, to share thoughts, facilitate change and get inspired by innovative ideas to make science greener and greener.
Gabriela Dankova
I am a PhD student at the Department of Genetic Identification at the Erasmus MC, University Medical Center in Rotterdam and in my project I study how our appearance is encoded in our DNA. I was always hugely in love with nature. That was one of the reasons why I decided to study biology and became a researcher. However, performing lab-based research comes with a lot of energy use and waste production, which can be detrimental to our natural world. Therefore, I feel a need to make my work more environmentally-friendly and I am very excited about the growing number of activities promoting more sustainable research, such as Green Labs NL. I believe that by working together we can really make a difference!
Marit de Kort
Hi there! My name is Marit and I am a PhD student at the NKI in Amsterdam. In my research I try to better understand transcription of a gene is regulated over time, by imaging single cells and observing transcriptional bursts of my favorite gene. In my private life I actively try to minimize my carbon footprint. This is in stark contrast to my lab work, where I create a lot of waste and use a lot of resources every day. I think it’s really important that we, scientists, take responsibility and collectively start working on the issue of sustainability in our labs. I’m excited to contribute by working with Green Labs NL towards more sustainable labs in the future.
Rolf Slaats
Hello, I am Rolf and I currently work as a Post Doc at the University of Twente. My scientific focus is on the development of stem cell-based in vitro models to study cardiac diseases and toxicities, so I am mostly working in “wet” labs culturing cells. It is in these labs that I realized how big our footprint on the environment is as scientists, since we consume large amounts of disposable plastics and electricity. This motivated me to focus my energy on reducing our impact on the planet as much as I can whilst still performing science. At Green Labs NL, we can make a difference by educating the scientific community in how to be scientifically successful and sustainable at the same time. I am proud to be a part of that movement.
Mariana Pelicano de Almeida
Hey! My name is Mariana and I am PhD student at the Department of Cell Biology at the Erasmus MC. My research focuses on the genetics of autism spectrum disorders and the role of chromatin modifiers in these syndromes. Although I love science, it weighs on me that it has such a large carbon footprint. Why should we study nature if we are killing it in the process? With Green Labs NL, I hope to be inspired and to inspire others to make science more and more sustainable!