2011
11 May
Benedata Pasquini, a Ph.D. student from the university of Florence: Universita' Di Firenze, Facotta' Di Farmacia arrived. She will study PCA and HCA on clinical data and food data obtained from HPLC methods. She will stay at the department till the 20th of July.
6 April
Ph.D. student Nguyen Xuan Cuong arrived at FABI. He comes from the Institute of Marine Biochemistry of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology. He will stay till 28th of June 2011 and will work on a bilateral project entitled: "Chemical studies and biological investigations of Vietnamese plants and herbal medicines from the Eupharbiaceae family to develop high-value health-care materials and their quantity control".
29 April
Ahmed Younes, became father of a second son, Omar at 8 pm. He measured 50.5 cm and weighed 3.170 kg at birth.
7 March
Ivana Stanimirova and Michal Daszykowski, both ex-FABI members, became the proud parents of their first son, Mateusz. He was born in the afternoon, weighs 3.05 kg and measures 53 cm. Congratulations to the new family! Enjoy these moments!
2 March
- Carmen Diaz-Regañón Casado arrived at our department. She comes from the university of Madrid: Universidad Complutense De Madrid. During her 5 month-stay she will work on chiral separations with reversed phase- liquid chromatography.
- On this same day, Petya Nikolova from the Medical University of Sofia (Bulgaria) arrived at FABI. She will stay for three months, working on a project handling about the comparison of designs applied on the separation of a tetracycline mixture.
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2010
24 December
After approximately 1,5 years of research Tessy Geerts left FABI. She will start a career as a community pharmacist. Her enthusiasm and devotion will surely be missed at FABI.
21 December
On Tuesday 21st of December Indiana Tanret successfully defended her Ph.D. thesis entitled: "Integrating polymer-based monolithic stationary phases in the capillary format to separate pharmaceuticals." Her promotorS during this thesis were Y. Vander Heyden and D. Mangelings. The whole department congratulates Indiana with this achievement. As stated previously she is now working as expert pharmacist in the center for pharmaceutical information of the APB.
27 November
On the 27th of November 2010 Sumate Thiangthum arrived at our department. Sumate is a Ph.D. Student in Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Phytochemistry at the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Mahidol University, Thailand. During his 6 month stay he will conduct research concerning hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography (HILIC). His project handles about the determination of heparin and its impurities in heparin products.
18 October
Dr. Agnieszka Arceusz graduated as a pharmacist at the University of Gdansk. In 2007, she obtained a Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical sciences at the department of Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Gdansk. During two months, she will work on fingerprints of willow bark samples obtained with RPLC.
30 September
Goedele Alaerts will remember this date as her last day at FABI. During her stay of six years, she analysed fingerprints of several herbs. Currently, she has a teaching position at Hogeschool West-Vlaanderen (campus Brugge). At FABI, she always performed her student tasks with great care and precision, so we know that she will take good care of the students.
17 September
Dr. Hoang Le Tuan Anh is working for the Institute of Marine Biochemistry (IMBC), Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST). He earned a Ph.D in Chungnam National University, Daejeon, South Korea in Medicinal Chemistry in 2009. During four months, he will work for both bilateral DWTC projects (Chemical studies and biological investigations of Vietnam plants and herbal medicines from the Euphobiaceae family to develop high-value healthcare materials and their quality control and Research on fingerprint of Chinese Materia Medica to develop standard and research protocols evaluating their identity, safety and reproducibility). His goal is to learn about the data handling of the fingerprint and apply that knowledge later in Vietnam.
31 August
After approximately five years, this was Indiana's last day at FABI. She was a wonderful colleague who was willing to help everyone at anytime. We will surely miss her and wish her al the luck with her new job as expert pharmacist in the centre for pharmaceutical information of the APB (Belgian Pharmaceutical Association).
Her thesis entitled "Integrating polymer-based monolithic stationary phases in the capillary format to separate pharmaceuticals" is submitted and now we are waiting for the decision of the jury.
24 August
In July 2009, Katrijn De Klerck obtained a Master in Drug Development (pharmacist) at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). The next month, she started a Ph.D. at FABI. Her research topic is entitled "Evaluation and development of a generic chiral separation strategy for supercritical fluid chromatography (SFC)".
30 June
Guido Wuestenbergs retirement will be celebrated. He leaves FABI after more than 38 years of work as technical support at the VUB. He will be missed by all colleagues for his help and good humour. We wish him all the best and hope he enjoys his cycling tours.
1 June
Dr. Yueqi Liu, a Ph. D graduated from the Lanzhou Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China, arrived at our department. For one year, he will work on an FWO (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen, a Flemish granting institute) project about "Synthesis and application of monolithic chiral capillary columns in pharmaceutical analysis".
17 May
Mohammad Goodarzi, graduated in applied chemistry, started his PhD at FABI. His project involves comparison of different feature selection methods and their introduction in QSAR studies, among other chemometric items.
10 April
Sara Taeymans, an ex-FABI technician, and Joeri Sempels are happily married. We wish them good fortune and happiness in their future life. Congratulations to Sara and Joeri!
1 February
Danstan Hipolite Shewiyo, pharmacist from the Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority, Quality Control Laboratory, joined FABI for the third time in his doctoral sandwich program. From October 2007, 16 months of his research will be performed in Belgium and 32 months in Tanzania. He is working on the development and validation of simple methods to analyse medicines used for the treatment of HIV/AIDS patients in Tanzania.
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2009
18 December
Melanie Dumarey defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Dissimilar chromatographic systems
in pharmaceutical analysis and life sciences". Her promotor is Y. Vander Heyden. From January, she will work as a Post on Process Analysis Technology (PAT) at the Umea University in Sweden, under supervision of Sir J. Trygg.
31 September
Prof Smeyers-Verbeke retired but kept ten percent of her position. In future, she still will teach the course Method validation to the Industrial Pharmacy students. Prof Y. Vander Heyden will be head of the department from 1 October.
14 September
Katarzyna Macur, a Ph.D. student from Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry of Medical University of Gdansk, Poland, arrived for a three months stay. She will perform a chemometric modelling of peptides retention in view of studies on the correctness of protein identificatios of Bacillus subtilis and HeLa cells proteomes.
12 September
Chen Zhao, a Ph.D. student from the department of Prof. G. Fan at the East China Medical University (Second Military Medical University) in Shanghai, arrived for a three and a half months' stay. He will perform scientific research about the analysis of traditional Chinese herbs by pCEC using self-synthesized polymerized monolithic columns.
29 August
Iulia Oita, Ph.D student at FABI, was awarded the prize for the best young scientist presentation during the fifth Symposium on Separations and Related Techniques by the Nordic Society of Separation Science. This symposium took place from the 26th to the 29th August in Tallinn, Estonia. The title of her presentation was 'Factors influencing poliovirus focusing during a capillary electrophoresis separation'.
24 August
- Tessy Geerts, who graduated as pharmacist in July 2009, started her Ph.D. at FABI. Her research topic is entitled "Theoretical descriptors in Quantitative Structure-Property Relationships (QSPR) and column classification".
- Maria Elisa Jorge RodriGuez, an associate professor from the Central University of Las Villas in Cuba arrived for a stay of two months. She will work on a VLIR project 'strengthening undergraduate and graduate education in Pharmaceutical Sciences'. Her research concerns the anti-oxidant capacity and chemical properties of etheric oils.
3 August
- Wiktoria Struck, a Ph.D. student from the department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the Medical University of Gdansk, arrived on 1st of August for a three months stay. She will perform scientific research in the context of the chromatographic analysis of nucleosides as a potential cancer markers.
- Lv Chunguang, Ph.D. in pesticide science from the China Agricultural University, arrived at FABI for a five months stay. His project involves the preparation and evaluation of chiral monolithic capillary columns
14 July
Sébastien Gourvénec and Sylvie Péron became the parents of their third child Corentin. He was born on 14 July 2009. Corentin weighs 3.660 kg and is 51 cm tall. Congratulations to the proud parents and sisters, Lisa and Clara!
5 July
Maria Merino-Arevalo and Oscar Pozo became the proud parents of their firstborn daughter, Mariona. Mariona, born on Sunday, at 10.19 PM, weighted 3.20 kg and was 51 cm tall at birth. Congratulations to the proud parents!
11 June
- Debby Mangelings and Kristof Van Aelbroeck became the proud parents of Senne.
On Thursday, at 8.15 AM, Senne was born. Senne: 3.34 kg and 50 cm. Congratulations to the proud parents!
- Debby Mangelings obtained a ZAP mandate (professor) for the next three years.
23 May
Ahmed Younes, PhD student of our departement, became on Saturday, 23.05.2009, the proud father of his first born son named Abdullah. The baby weighed 4 kg and measured 53 cm at birth. Congratulations to the proud parents!
18 May
Prof. Emilia Barcia of the departement of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Technology at the Complutense University of Madrid has arrived on Monday the 18th of May and will teach this week in the course "Topics in Pharmaceutical Research" in the 1st Master in Drug Development. The subject of her course is biopharmaceutics and pharmacokinetics.
1 April
Ahmed Younes, a graduate from The Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Helwan University (Egypt) joined our departement. He started his Ph.D. programme on ‘the enantionseparation of pharmaceuticals using normal phase liquid chromatographic technique’.
Februari
Nguygen Hoai Nam, a former visiting PhD student from the Institute of Natural Products Chemistry of the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology, became the father of Nguyen Nam Anh. Congratulations to the proud parents!
20 January
Hadewych Halewyck, PhD student from the department of Farmaceutische Biotechnologie en Moleculaire Biochemie who cooperates with our Iulia Oita, became on Thuesday, at 20.01.2009, the proud mother of a daughter, Niobe. She weighted 3.4.kg and measured 50 cm at born. Congratulations to the proud parents!
26 January
Nele, an ex-FABI doctoral sutdent and postdoc, and Geert Clinckspoor-Matthijs became the proud parents of Anne-Sophie, a sister for Pieter-Jan.
On Monday, at 11.44 AM, Anne-Sophie was born. Nele and Geert announced that she weighs 3.8 kg and measures 51 cm. Congratulations to the proud parents and brother!
11 January
Danstan H. Shewiyo, a pharmacist working as a drug qualilty control analyst at the Quality Control Laboratory of the Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority, joined us for a second period of three months at FABi, within the sandwich PH.D. project with the School of Pharmacy of the Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences, Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania and our department. His project is entiteld 'Development and validation of simple analytical methods for analysis of antiretroviral drugs for the management of HIV/AIDS in Tanzania'.
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2008
1 December
Sigrid Pieters, an industrial pharmacist, starts her Ph.D. at
FABI. She will work with miniaturized separation techniques in
fingerprint and pharmaceutical analysis.
22 November
Maria Merino, working as a technician at FABI, and Oscar Pozo are happily married. The Spanish couple ordered snow on their marriage in Gent. We wish them good fortune and happiness in their future life. Congratulations to Maria and Oscar!
14 October
Dr. Zhanying HONG, a PhD student graduated from Second Military Medical University located in Shanghai,China, arrived in Belgium for a stay of three months. She will work in the context of a bilateral DWTC project between Belgium (federal government) and P.R. China. The project is entitled 'Research on fingerprints of Chinese Materia Medica to develop standard and research protocols evaluating their identity, safety and reproducibility'.
17 September
Raf Put defends his PhD. thesis entitled: "Alternative approaches to build quantitative
structure-retention relationships". His promotor is Y. Vander Heyden.
18 August
Ans Hendrickx, a bio-engineer, joined the department to start
a Ph.D. She will separate chiral compounds with capillary electrochromatography
and capillary liquid chromatography. She also became the aunt
of Thor, the son of her sister, on the 19th of august.
15 July
- Dr. Xiaoping WU, PhD in science from the Fuzhou University in China, arrived at our department for a stay of seven months. She will work in the context of a bilateral BWS project between Flanders and China titled “Design and application of new stationary phases for (pressurized) capillary electrochromatography”. The Chinese promoter is Prof. Dr. Chao Yan of the Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
- Today, Goedele Alaerts and Hans Logie married in the city hall of Sint-Agatha Berchem. After the ceremony, bride and groom were treated to a rain of rice when coming out of the building. We wish both of them lots of happiness and luck in their marriage, and also much working pleasure in their new house.
30 June
Prof J. Smeyers-Verbeke rejoined the department after a revalidation period.
5 June
Vanessa and Christophe Arnould-Reynders became the proud parents of a daughter, Abigael, on the 5th of June. Abigael weighs 3.390 kg and measures 51 cm. Congratulations to the parents!
29 May
Phuong Doan Lan, a Ph.D. student graduated from the National University of Hanoi and working in the Institute of Natural Products Chemistry VAST of Vietnam, joined our department for a stay of four months. Her subject of interest is “Chromatographic fingerprinting of natural products”.
24 May
Prof Y. Smeyers-Verbeke, head of the department, became the proud grandmother of Alex, son of Marina and Michael Smeyers-Pascuzzi. Congratulations to the proud parents and grandparents!
19 May
Professors Manuel Cordoba-Diaz and Rocio Herrero-Vanrell of the department of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Technology at the Complutense University of Madrid have arrived and will teach this week in the course "Topics in Pharmaceutical Research" in the 1st Master in Drug Development. Pharmaceutical Technology in the Industry' will be given by Professor Manuel Cordoba-Diaz. Professor Rocio Herrero-Vanrell will talk about Pharmaceutical Research for the development of new ophthalmic formulations.
12 January
Dr. Chiyang He, a Ph D graduated from the College of Chemistry & Molecular Engineering of Peking University in China, came to our department on 12 January 2008. For one year, he will work on an FWO project about "Separation technology-related miniaturization and fingerprints in pharmaceutical analysis".
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2007
5 November
- Alexandra Durand, graduated as a doctor
in science in 2007 in France, arrived at our departement. She will
work for one year as a postdoc in Chemometrics in the TRACE_European
Project.
- Ewa Szymanska, a Ph.D. student from the department of Prof.
R. Kaliszan at the Medical University of Gdansk, arrived for a 1
month stay. Her subject of interest is the pattern recognition of
urinary nucleosides profiles from healthy and cancer patients.
1 October
- Danstan H. Shewiyo, a pharmacist working as a drug
qualilty control analyst at the Quality Control Laboratory of the
Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority (which is a food and drugs regulatory
body under the ministry of health and social welfare of the Tanzanin
government), started at our department for a 4-year PhD program.
His project is entiteld 'Development and validation of simple analytical
methods for analysis of antiretroviral drugs for the management
of HIV/AIDS in Tanzania'. As he will be working in both laboratories
in Tanzania and in Belgium, his first stay in Brussels will be till
the end of the year. In Tanzania, he has a promotor from the School
of Pharmacy of the Muhimbili University College of Health Sciences,
Dar-es-Salaam.
- Karolina Bodzioch, a Ph.D. student
from the department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the Medical University
of Gdansk, Poland, arrived for a 13 months stay. During her stay
she will work on a doctoral thesis with as research topic the modeling
of chromatographic data, such as for instance, the modeling of chromatographic
retention as a function of molecular descriptors. Moreover, the
retention time of peptide on CEC columns will be measured and modeled,
and also biological activities of herbal extracts will be modeled
as a function of fingerprint chromatograms.
- Christophe Tistaert, graduated as pharmacist in July 2007 at the Katholieke
Universiteit Leuven (KUL), starts his Ph.D. at FABI. His research
topic concerns: "Development and data-analysis of fingerprints from
plantextracts."
- Bieke Dejaegher starts a three-year
FWO (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen, a Flemish granting
institute) post-doctoral grant. Her project is entitled "Separometrics.
Contributions to faster and more efficient method development and
validation of pharmaceutical analytical separation methods."
7 August
Wang Jiajing, a phD from the Second Military University, Shanghai
city, China, joined FABI. She will stay here for five months for
a project 'the development of fingerprints by pressurized capillary
electro chromatography'.
28 September
After a stay of four
years, Sonia Caetano will join Xavier Capron in France. We wish
her lots of success in her future career.
14 September
Sonia Caetano defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Chemometrics: From pharmaceutical
analysis to food traceability". Her promotor is Y. Vander Heyden".
3 September
Barbara Sparzak, from the Department of Pharmacognosy
with Medicinal Plant Garden of the Medical University of Gdansk,
Poland, arrived at our departement for a two-months stay. Her work
involves the 'Optimization of the evaporative light scattering detector
parameters in HPLC-DAD-ELS analysis of anthocyanins and other polyphenols
of different varieties of red raspberries.'
21 June
- The poster entitled "Orthogonal projection approach to select
dissimilar chromatographic systems" of M. Dumarey, E. Van Gyseghem,
Y. Vander Heyden was selected at HPLC 2007, Gent, Belgium, by
an International Panel composed of academics from Pharmaceutical
Institutes and Scientists from the Pharmaceutical Industry for
its outstanding contribution to Innovation in Pharmaceutical Analysis.
- Melanie Dumarey obtained her two-year renewal of her IWT (Institute
for Science and Technology, a Flemish granting institute) doctoral
grant.
30 May
Eric Deconinck defends his PhD. thesis entitled: "Tree-based modeling
approaches to predict membrane passage properties of drugs". His
promotors are Prof. Dr. Y. Vander Heyden and Prof. Dr. D. Coomans.
29 May
Bieke Dejaegher defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "New aspects in robustness testing". Her promotors are Prof. Dr. J. Smeyers-Verbeke and Prof. Dr. Y. Vander Heyden".
20 May
Nguygen Hoai Nam, a PhD student from the Institute of Natural Products Chemistry of the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology arrived at our department for a five months stay. His work is situated in the Flemish-Vietnamese Bilateral project "Phytochemical and biological studies of Vietnamese herbal medicine for the development of high-value healthcare products".
7 May
- Maria Merino will be working as a laboratory technician in a project between The Royal Military Academy and N. Pattyn (department of Psychology) about "Identification of pheromones in stress situations". The experiments for this project are executed at FABI. Maria has graduated as physicist in June 1999 in Barcelona, Spain.
- Karolina Bodzioch, a Ph.D. student from the department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the Medical University of Gdansk, arrived for a 2 months stay. During her stay she will measure the retention of amino acids and peptides to use in further QSRR calculations.
28 March
Chantal Holvoet defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Cyclodextrins
and liposomes in formulations with slightly water soluble pharmaca".
Her promotors are Prof. Dr. J. Plaizier-Vercammen and Prof. Dr.
Y. Vander Heyden.
1 March
Iulia Oita started her Ph.D at FABI. Her research topic concerns
"Development and optimization of separation methods for viral compounds".
Iulia has graduated as pharmacist in September 1999 in Iasi, Romania.
26 February
Xavier Capron, defends his PhD. thesis entitled: "Updating and
maintenance of multivariate regression and classification models".
His promotors are Prof. Dr. D. L. Massart †, Prof. Dr. J. Smeyers-Verbeke
and Prof. Dr. B. Walczak.
26 February
Prof. Dr. Beata Walczak of the Department of Chemometrics, University
of Silesia, Katowice, Poland is arrived at FABI and will join us
for the next three months.
16 February
Peggy Verbuyst and Nico De Corte became the proud parents of
Zoë on 16 February 2007. Congratulations to the proud parents!
12 February
Debby Mangelings has been selected as laureate of the bi-annual National Prize of the Begian
Society of Pharmaceutical Sciences with her Ph.D thesis, entitled
"Evaluation of capillary electrochromatography as chiral separation
technique - Definition of a Generic Separation Strategy".
7 February
Delphine and Eric Bouveresse-Jouan-Rimbaud became the proud
parents of Alienor on 7 February, at 11.55h. Alienor weighs 2.94
kg and measures 49 cm. Congratulations to the proud parents!
22 January
We welcome Marleen Van der Linden, who started
as a parttime analyst at FABI. She already worked for 32 years
at the departments "Chemie der Proteïnen, Reproductieve Biochemie
and Medische Biochemie" of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
18 January
Jan Luypaert defends his thesis entitled "Data preprocessing
methods to improve the results of qualitative and quantitative
pharmaceutical NIR applications on creams and green tea." His
promotors are Prof. D.L. Massart † and Prof. Dr. Y. Vander Heyden.
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2006
11 December
Nele and Geert Clinckspoor-Matthijs became the proud parents of Pieter-Jan.
On Monday, at 6.36 PM, Pieter-Jan was born. Nele and Geert announced that Pieter-Jan weighs 3.610 kg and measures 49 cm.
Congratulations to the proud parents!
30 November
Prof. dr. Danny Coomans of the James Cook University and part-time at FABI, joins us for a period of one month.
31 October
After a period of 6 years at FABI, Post-doc Nele Matthijs started
a new job as Pharmacist-inspector at the governmental health consumer
department. We wish her all the best in her new job.
26 October
Sébastien Gourvénec and Sylvie Péron became
the parents of their second daughter Clara. She was born on Thursday,
26 October 2006 at 23h05. Clara weighs 3.350 kg and is 50cm tall.
Congratulations to the proud parents!
1 October
- Debby Mangelings starts a three-year post-doctoral grant of the Research Foundation Flanders (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen). The subject she will be working on is entitled "Development of stationary phases for capillary-, pressurized capillary and chip electrochromatographic applications"
- Hasret Ates, graduated as pharmacist in July 2006, starts her Ph.D. at FABI. Her research topic concerns: "Screening of new polysaccharide based chiral stationary phases for the separation of enantiomers by means of High Pressure Liquid Chromatography."
29 September
- Raf Put left FABI after a period of five years as assistant. He started his new job as a pharmacist in Turnhout, Belgium.
- After a stay of four years, Xavier Capron started his new job as a chemometrician at the French Petroleum Institute (IFP) in Lyon, France. We wish both lots of success in their new challenge.
31 August
Sara Taeymans, who worked two years at FABI as a technician, graduated as teacher. In this new school year, she is teaching physics and chemistry to 15-16 year old pupils in the College Hagelstein in Sint-Katelijne-Waver (Belgium). Whe wish her good luck and enjoyment with her class!
26 June
Qishu Qu, a post-doc from the College of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering of the Yangzhou University has joined FABI for a period of ten months. His subject of interest is the design of micrometer to sub-micrometer silica particles for pressurized capillary electrochromatography.
16 June
One month after the defence of her PhD, Anne-Marie van Nederkassel left FABI.
We wish her good luck in her new position at the Academisch Ziekenhuis (AZ-VUB) as scientific staff member in the department of Clinical Chemistry.
20 March
Debby Mangelings defends her thesis entitled "Evaluation
of Capillary Electrochromatography as Chiral Separation Technique.
Definition of a Generic Separation Strategy." Her promotor
was Prof. Dr. Y. Vander Heyden.
1 March
- Indiana Tanret, graduated as a pharmacist in July 2005, starts her Ph.D. at FABI. Her research topic concerns the use of monolithic columns in capillary electrochromatography.
- Prof. Dr. Beata Walczak, Krzysztof Kaczmarek and Tomek Czekaj
of the Department of Chemometrics, University of Silesia, Katowice,
Poland are arrived at FABI and will join us for the next three
months.
3 February
Dr. Roy De Maesschalck announces the birth of Bram, a brother
for Amber and Manu. Congratulations to the parents!
2 February
Dr. Bisoendath Rambali is the proud father of his first son Arav
Nishant. Congratulations to the parents!
26 January
Nele Matthijs defends her thesis entitled "Computer-assisted
method development applied to the chiral separation of products
of pharmaceutical importance". Her promotor was Prof. Dr. Y. Vander
Heyden. The first of February, she starts her Post-doc at our
department.
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2005
23 December
- Nele Matthijs obtained a two-year IWT (Institute for Science
and Technology, a Flemish granting institute) post-doctoral
grant. Her project, performed in cooperation with Conforma (Destelbergen)
involves fingerprint development, data treatment and extraction
of information related to Chinese herbs.
- Melanie Dumarey obtained a two-year IWT doctoral grant.
17 Oktober
Elke Van Gysegem defends her thesis entitled "Orthogonal
chromatographic systems for the characterization of impurities
in drugs", promoter: Y. Vander Heyden. We wish her good luck
during her post-doc in the Laboratory for Pharmaceutical Technology
and Biopharmacy of Prof. G. Van den Mooter and Prof. P. Augustijns
(KUL).
27 September
Ivana Stanimirova obtained her PhD with her thesis "Exploratory
analysis of environmental data". Her promotors were Prof.
Y. Vander Heyden, Prof. B. Walczak and Prof. D.L. Massart. From
October 1st, she shall work at the University of Silesia, Katowice,
Poland.
26 September
Ling Jin defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Simplex local
methods for multivariate calibration." Her promotors were
Prof. Dr. D. L. Massart, Prof. J. Smeyers-Verbeke and Prof. Dr.
Q. S. Xu. Afterwards she joined her family in China.
29 August
Melanie Dumarey, graduated as pharmacist July 2005, started her
Ph.D. at FABI. Her research topic is entitled "Orthogonal
chromatographic systems in pharmaceutical analysis: selection,
application, method development and data-analysis."
16 August
Indiana Tanret, who graduated as a pharmacist in July 2005 joined
FABI for a year as a pedagogic assistant.
30 June
Cheng-Jian Xu from the Central South University of China, left
FABI after a period of one year and a half. From the beginning
of 2006, he will do post-doc research in Hongkong for one year.
1 June
- Dr. Michal Daszykowski from the University of Silesia, Katowice,
Poland arrives at FABI for a period of 3 months.
- Concepción Carretero Rivera from the Universidad de Valladolid
in Spain arrived for a stage of 3 months to work on chemometric
methods for her Ph. D.
13 May
Frederik Questier defends his PhD. thesis entitled: "Contributions
to Clustering and Feature Selection Methods for Clustering."
His promoters are Prof. Y. Vander Heyden, Prof. B. Walczak and
Prof. D. L. Massart.
29 April
Annie De Schrijver's retirement was celebrated. She left FABI
after more than 35 years of work as laboratory assistant at FABI.
She will be missed by all colleagues and students for her everlasting
patience and good humour. We wish her all the best and hope she
enjoy her cycling tours.
31 March
-
Elke Van Gyseghem left FABI. She finished her Ph.D. research about
selecting orthogonal chromatographic systems for the characterization
of impurities in drugs after a period of four and a half years
at FABI. We wish her good luck at her new position at the Laboratory
for Pharmaceutical Technology and Biopharmacy of Prof. G. Van
den Mooter
and Prof. P. Augustijns (KUL). Her new research subject consists
of maximizing the lymphatic absorption of anti-HIV drugs.
- Peter Forlay-Frick returns to Hungary after a stay of 9 months
at our department. He has found a job in industry.
22 March
Menghui Zhang defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Multivariate
calibration of the antioxidant capacity of green tea." Her
promoters were Prof. Dr. D. L. Massart, Prof. Y. Vander Heyden
and Prof. Dr. Q. S. Xu. Afterwards she joined her family in China.
28 February
Shen Wei-Yang of the China Pharmaceutical University, who worked
on methodologies for the development of fingerprints of Chinese
drugs, left FABI after a period of 10 months and returned to his
old university.
15 February
Prof. Dr. Beata Walczak, Krzysztof Kaczmarek and Tomek Czekaj
of the Department of Chemometrics, University of Silesia, Katowice,
Poland are arrived at FABI. Krzysztof Kaczmarek is a post doc.
His main research interest at FABI is analysis of multivariate
data containing outlying objects. Tomek Czekaj is a Ph.D. student.
The main goal of his study is exploration and modelling of microarray
data.
11 February
Sébastien Gourvénec, defends his PhD. thesis entitled:
"Chemometric methods for batch process control using NIR
spectroscopy." His promoters were Prof. Dr. D. L. Massart
and Prof. Dr. J. Smeyers-Verbeke".
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2004
18 December
Tim Hancock, Ph.D. student of Prof. Danny Coomans, left FABI
after a period of about two months.
3 December
Prof. Jure Zupan officially accepted the responsibility of the
Minister of the Higher Education, Science and Technology. He hopes
to be able to make some improvements towards better environment
and conditions for the research and educational ambience in Slovenia.
November
Prof. Massart will receive the 2005 Eastern Analytical Symposium
Award for Outstanding Achievements in Chemometrics. This award
will be officially presented at a symposium in his honour at the
2005 Eastern Analytical Symposium (November 14-17, 2005 in Somerset,
New Jersey, USA).
15 November
Piotr Kawczak left FABI to return to Poland.
10 November
Erwin Adams (KUL), Péter Forlay-Frick (FABI-VUB), Jànos
Elek (University of Debrecen) and David Clicq (CHIS-VUB) gave
a presentation at the workshop of the Flemish-Hungarian Bilateral
project (project nr. BIL01/23).
8 November
Janos Elek returned for a period of two weeks, during which he
gave a presentation for the workshop of the Flemish-Hungarian
Bilateral project (project nr. BIL01/23) concerning "Use
of chemometric modelling in the hydrogenation of aqueous NaHCO3
solution". The second goal of his visit was to describe a
new biphasic catalytic system for the selective hydrogenation
of cinnamaldehyde, with experimental design approach and optimisation
of the process.
1 November
Sébastien Gourvénec left FABI after spending four
dedicated years of chemometric research at our department. He
is now employed by GlaxoSmithKline R&D in Stevenage (United
Kingdom), at the Process Analytical Technologies and Chemometrics
section, where he is still involved with chemometrics and data
analysis. All FABIers thank him for his outstanding computer support!
21 October
Timothy Hancock is a Ph.D. student coming from the Department
of Mathematics and Statistics at the James Cook University, Townsville,
Australia. He is supervised by Prof. Danny Coomans. He will test
new mathematical methods, primarily tree based methods on different
data sets.
29 September
Dr. Michal Daszykowski returned to Poland, to the university
of Katowice.
20 September
Jan Luypaert left FABI after a 5-years stay as an assistant.
He starts working at Roche in Anderlecht. We thank him for his
everlasting smile and fine sense of humor.
15 September
- Margriet Gabriëls succesfully defended her Ph.D. thesis
entitled: "Physico-chemical and Pharmaceutical-technological
Evaluation of natural and semi-synthetic Compounds of Artemisia
annua L. plant". Congratulations to Griet!
- Sara Taeymans replaces Iris Van den Steen as analyst. She graduated
as industrial engineer at the Hogeschool Antwerpen in june 2004.
- Goedele Alaerts started her Ph.D. at FABI. She graduated in
July 2004 as pharmacist. The work she started in October 2004
is the evaluation of Capillary Electro Chromatography (CEC) for
the separation of amino acids and neuropeptides. This is situated
in a larger project dealing with the development and evaluation
of fingerprint chromatograms.
14 September
Piotr Kawczak arrived at FABI. He is a Ph.D. student from the
department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the University of Gdansk. During
his stay of two months, he will determine the retention of xanthine
derivatives on different MLC systems in order to predict their
logP.
6 September
Dr. Qing-Song Xu returned to the Hunan University, P.R.China,
College of Econometrics and Mathematics.
19 August
Iris Van den Steen quited her job as analyst at FABI. She started
a Ph.D. preparation program at the University of Ghent.
June
- Michal Marshal and Pawel Wiczling, two doctoral students from
the department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the University of Gdansk,
returned to Poland after a stay of 3 months.
- Prof. Massart was invited to write a column about "Practical
Data Handling" in the LC/GC-Europe journal (www.lcgceurope.com).
A first column, called "What can chemometrics do for separation
science?" appeared in the september edition (vol. 17, nr.
9, p. 467). In the november edition (vol.17, nr. 11, p. 586),
the second part was published, entitled: "From Tables to
Visuals: Principal Component Analysis, Part 1".
21 June
Ann Detroyer defends her PhD. thesis entitled: "Micellar
Liquid Chromatography for high-throughput membrane permeability
assessment of drugs". The promotors are D.L. Massart and
Y. Vander Heyden. Congratulations to Ann from the FABIers!
1 June
A new guest-researcher arrived. His name is Peter Forlay-Frick,
who came from the department of Prof. K. Héberger in Budapest
(Hungary). He will work in a Flemish-Hungarian bilateral project
(Evaluation of the use of macrocycles for the separation of metal
ions and of positional isomers). He was engaged in classification
of RP-HPLC columns with PCA for his PhD. thesis.
27 May
Bisoendath Rambali defended his Ph D. thesis entitled: "The
Use of Experimental Design for Pharmaceutical Product Development".
His promotors were L. Baert, D.L. Massart and Y. Vander Heyden.
Congratulations to Bisoen from the FABIers!
2 May
Wei-Yang Shen arrived. He is a researcher related to the bilateral
project "Methodology and Guidelines for the fingerprint chromatogram
of the herbal Medicines" (Flanders-China). He will stay for
10 months. In China, he was employed as a teacher at the China
Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, instructing the courses of
Analytical Chemistry and studying on the quality control of drugs
in pharmaceutical analysis.
5 April
Anandanatarajan Sethuraman joined us. He will prepare his thesis
to obtain the degree of Master in Medical and Pharmaceutical Research.
The topic of the thesis is the study of a set of orthogonal HPLC
systems in a QSRR context.
15 March
Iris Van den Steen started her job as analyst. She graduated
in June 2003 as industrial engineer at KaHo Sint-Lieven, Ghent.
She replaces Vanessa Reynders (after Kristof Gillisjans).
1 March
Michal Marshal and Pawel Wiczling, two Polish doctoral students
from the department of Prof. R. Kaliszan at the University of
Gdansk, arrived for a stay of 3 months. The goal of their work
was to measure retention times for different peptides on several
chromatographic systems. The eventual aim is to predict retention
by using molecular descriptors. Different chemometric methods
will be applied.
17 February
Anita Vanderstraeten, laboratory assistant and secretary, who
will leave FABI by the end of this month, was celebrated by the
people of FABI (photos).
She retires and we all hope she can enjoy immensely all the free
time. Simultaneously, the earlier retirement of Prof. Massart
was honoured with a reception.
9 February
Debby Mangelings was selected by the Halasz Award Committee for
the 2004 Halasz Award in form of a travel grant to participate
in HPCE 2004 to be held in Salzburg, Austria, February 8-12. The
award will be presented at the Opening Ceremony of HPCE 2004,
on Monday morning, 9th of February.
30 January
- Chantal Holvoet, doctoral student of Prof. Plaizier-Vercammen
and Prof. Massart leaves us after a period of four years. In the
future, she will start working in the pharmacy whilst finishing
her doctoral thesis.
- Kristof Gillisjans resigned as laboratory assistant. From 2nd
of February, he will start working at the Belgian Post Group,
where he will take up an ICT-job.
19 January
János Elek returned for a period of two weeks to perform
an experimental design study.
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2003
18 December
Eric Deconinck obtained a two-year doctoral grant from the IWT
(Institute for Science and Technology, a Flemish granting institute),
which can be prolonged to four years. This year, a record number
of 686 candidates tried to obtain this grant. As only about 150
candidates (first and second time applicants) can be selected,
this is a great result. Congratulations to Eric!
16 December
Cathérine Perrin, former PhD. student at FABI and now
working as maître de conférences at the Université
Montpellier 1 in France, and her friend Louis Lietaer, welcomed
their son Frédéric on Tuesday 16th of December.
Congratulations to the new parents!!
3 December
Cheng-Jian Xu, who graduated in November 2003 as doctoral student
of Prof. Yi-Zeng Liang in the Institute of Chemometrics and Intelligent
Analytical Instruments at the Central South University, arrived
in FABI on Dec. 3. 2003. The aim of his job at FABI is to analyze
the batch data sets for quality control and to develop guidelines
for the fingerprint of herbal medicines.
21 November
Gabriel Vivó left FABI after a stay of three months. During
this period, he built a software tool for automated chromatographic
peak deconvolution.
28 October
Anne-Marie van Nederkassel won the third prize in the Best Poster
Prize contest, sponsored by Chemometrics and Intelligent Laboratory
Systems during the congress of "Advances in Chromatography
and Electrophoresis - Conferentia Chemometrica 2003".
27 October
On Monday, at 00:45 PM, Sander was born. He is the son of Katelijne
De Cock, laboratory assistant of FABI (Prof. Plaizier), and her
husband Wim. Sander weighs 3.380 kg and measures 50 cm. Congratulations
to both parents!
30 September
Ann Detroyer left FABI after five years of PhD. She starts working
half of October at the University of Paris for a duration of one
year, where she will be teaching chemistry to Pharmacy students
and will finish her thesis to obtain her doctor's degree in Pharmaceutical
Sciences. We all wish Ann a lot of success.
26 September
A reception (photos)
was organized for the retirement of Prof. Massart. Speeches were
given by Prof. Smeyers-Verbeke, Prof. Michotte, Prof. Plaizier-Vercammen,
Prof. Coomans, Prof. Vercruysse, and prof. Van Steirteghem (dean
of the faculty) in which the achievements of Prof. Massart were
mentioned and to thank him for all the excellent and dedicated
efforts during his 35 years of service at FABI, at the pharmaceutical
institute and at the VUB. Prof. Massart keeps 10% of his mandate
and will continue teaching bromatology and co-ordinatingthe chemometry
research at FABI.
25 August
Gabriel Vivó arrived at FABI. He obtained a grant from
the Valencian Science and Technology Agency to perform a predoctoral
stay for three months (from August 19th to November 19th). The
topic of the project was to develop a program for automatic detection
and deconvolution of chromatographic peaks.
23 August
Raul Conde Carrasco passed away dramatically on Saturday afternoon.
The Embassy of Mexico took care of the repatriation of his body.
All FABIers condole the family.
3 September
Ji Yibing, a PhD student from the China Pharmaceutical University
of Nanjing, arrived at FABI for a stay of 10 months within the
framework of a bilateral scientific and technological cooperation
project of the VUB with partner country China. The aim is to study
the methodology to develop fingerprint chromatograms and to define
guidelines for the quality control of herbal medicines based on
the outcome of the fingerprint chromatograms.
1 September
Bieke Dejaegher, who graduated in June 2003 as pharmacist, started
her PhD at FABI. She obtained an OZR scholarship. The aim of her
study is to contribute to faster and more efficient development
and validation of pharmaceutical analytical separation methods
by means of minimal experimental designs and robustness testing,
by using and predicting the separation on short classical chromatographic
columns and using internal standards as calibration standards.
22 August
Prof. Dr. Mirela Praisler and her assistant Steluta Gosav left
FABI.
18 August
Eric Deconinck started his PhD at our department. He graduated
in June 2003 as industrial pharmacist at the VUB. He will be working
on prediction of absorption, using CART, MARS and PLS on retention
data.
1 August
Prof. Massart became grandfather for the second time. Lore was
born in Ghent on Friday August 1st and is the little sister of
Cattoo.
27 July
Vera Schoonjans and Yves Matthijs became the parents of a son,
Briek. He was born on Sunday July 27th in Aalst, he weighs 3.460
kg and has a length of 49.50 cm. It is the first grandchild of
Anita Schoonjans, analyst and secretary at FABI.
31 July
Sonia Caetano is leaving FABI after a training period of 5 months
and will finish in September her last year of Chemical Engineering
at the Instituto Superior Tecnico in Lisbon, Portugal.
15 July
Prof. Dr. Mirela Praisler and assistant Steluta Gosav arrived
at FABI and will stay until the end of August. They come from
the Department of Physics of the Faculty of Science at the University
of Galati in Romania. During their stay, they will perform class
identity recognition of amphetamines using Artificial Neural Networks
and GC-IR spectra.
2 July
Carine Vannecke and Yvan Vander Heyden became the proud parents
of twin daughters, Lissa and Laura. Lissa weighs 3.170 kg and
is 50 cm, Laura weighs 3.000 kg and measures 49.5 cm. They were
born in Aalst. Photos.
28 June
Nele Matthijs and Geert Clinckspoor married. Bride and groom
were breathtakingly dressed. They shined from their arrival with
the old-timer bus at the church till the late morning hours. Photos.
26 June
Janos Elek left FABI after a stay of 6 months. He will finish
his Ph.D. at the University of Debrecen (Prof. Dr. Ferenc Joó).
During his stay, he used an experimental design approach to optimize
some chiral CE separations using dual chiral selection systems
(a cyclodextrin and a diazo-crown-ether).
20 June
On Friday, Vera and Mila Pravda welcomed their son, Thomas, at
21:30 in the Erinville Maternity Hospital in Cork. Tomas weighs
4.48 kg and has a length of 55 cm. Further details and photos
of the proud parents and their son are kept in a diary
13 June
Michal Daszykowski successfully had his doctor-degree's defence
at the Department of Chemistry of the Silesian University in Katowice
(Poland). The thesis is entitled: "Exploration of multidimensional
chemical data; methods of compression and viualization",
and his promotor was Prof. Beata Walczak.
13 June
Friday evening, at 7 pm, Corentin was born. He is the son of
Delphine and Eric Bouveresse, both former FABI members. Corentin
weighs 3.2 kg and his size is 53 cm. Photos.
1 May
Yvan Vander Heyden obtained 20% of a ZAP mandate (professor).
17 May
Sébastien Gourvénec and Sylvie Péron welcomed
their little girl named Lisa.
She was born in Oostende on Saturday May 17th (00h05 AM), with
a weight of 3kg550 and a length of 52cm.
7 May
Anna de Juan Capdevila, who in the past joined FABI for a period
of one year, passed the exams for a new fixed position of Associate
Professor at the Dept. of Analytical Chemistry of the Universitat
de Barcelona. She will stay working in the Chemometrics group
of Prof. R. Tauler, of which she was already a member during her
Ph.D.
26-28 March
ChemoAC exists 10 years. To celebrate this, the ChemoAC meeting
was extended with 2 days of VICIM symposium on March 27th and
28th, at the VUB campus in Etterbeek. The number of participants
was about 100. Photos.
March 3
Sonia Caetano, a student of the last year of Chemical Engineering
at the Instituto Superior Tecnico in Lisbon, Portugal, will have
a stage of 5 months at FABI. She will work with Sebastien Gourvenec
to analyse data using the Orthogonal Projection Approach.
February 25
Paqui Cuesta Sánchez, an ex-FABI member, and her friend,
Bart Rumes, became the proud parents of a daughter, Ana.
February 20
Juan Antonio Fernández Pierna presents his thesis entitled
"Improvements in the multivariate calibration processes"
in order to obtain his doctor's degree. All FABIers wish him a
lot of success.
February 15
Prof. Dr. Beata Walczak joins us again for a period of about
six months.
February 1
Two former Ph.D. students start working in their new job:
- Juan Antonio Fernández Pierna in the "Centre de
Recherches Agronomiques de Gembloux" with Dr. Dardenne.
- Frederik Questier as an educational technologist / ICT-expert
at the VUB group of educational innovation, where he will help
starting up a new Educational Service Centre.
January 31
Prof. Dr. Hu Yuzhu from the China Pharmaceutical Univerisity
in Nanjing, and mother of Yinghua, stayed one week to discuss
the joint project with FABI. It is a bilateral scientific and
technological cooperation, entitled "Methodology and Guidelines
for the quality control of fingerprint chromatograms of herbal
medicines".
January 9
Erwin Adams and his wife were proud to anounce the birth of Margaux,
a sister for Matthias.
January 6
János Elek, working for the Academy of Hungarian Sciences
at the University of Debrecen in the Research Group of Homogenous
Catalysis (Prof. Dr. Ferenc Joó) came to us for a period
of six months. During his stay, which is supported by a BIL grant
of the Flemish government, he will optimize some chiral CE separations
using dual chiral selection systems, i.e. a cyclodextrin and a
diazo-crown-ether.
January 1
Frederik Questier has left FABI. He intends to submit his Ph.D.
thesis later this year.
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2002
December 10
Ling Jin married Yingliang Wu during her Christmas holidays in
China. Congratulations from all the FABIers.
December 19
Two former Ph.D. students will defend their thesis to obtain
a doctor's degree :
- Edelgard Hund with the subject :"Estimation and Reduction
of the Uncertainty of Measurement Results in Analytical Chemistry"
- Frédéric Estienne with "New Trends in Multivariate
Analysis and Calibration".
All FABIers wish the two defenders a lot of success.
December 6
- Yvan Vander Heyden won the prize of the Fifth Department of
the Academy for Medicine of Belgium, period 2000-2002 with his
text entitled :"Robuustheidstesten voor biomedische en famaceutische
analysemethoden".
- Anne-Marie van Nederkassel won the price 'Prix Junior' for the
best oral presentation at the Congress 'Chimiométrie 2002'
on 4 and 5 December 2002 in Paris, France. Her presentation was
entitled "Méthode de 'warping' optimisé par
corrélation. Application à la chromatographie liquide".
- Nele Matthijs had her civil marriage with Geert Clinkspoor.
Congratulations to Nele en Geert!
December 1
Juan Antonio Fernandez Pierna has left our laboratory after a
stay of 4 years. During this period he particularly did research
concerning outlier detection. We wish him a lot of succes in his
future private life and carreer.
October 28
Abdessamed Elkihel, a student from the ULB, did his computer
thesis for a period of 6 weeks, and was supervised by Elke Van
Gyseghem. The aim was to perform hierarchical 2-way clustering
and 2-way ordering techniques, principal component analysis and
the Kennard and Stone algorithm on different chromatographic datasets
and sets of molecular descriptors.
October 1
- Today, Gabriel Vivo, a student from the University of Valencia,
Spain, arrived at FABI. He will join forces with Anne-Marie Van
Nederkassel on deconvolution of overlapping peaks in chromatograms
obtained by fast RP-HPLC. He will stay here for a period of two
weeks.
- Xavier Capron, a student from the Université de Lille
et Brest, France, started his Ph.D. during which he will be working
on model updating and calibration.
September 15
Catherine Perrin left FABI today. She obtained a job at the Université
Montpellier 1 in France, where she will be teaching students (maître
de conférences).
September 6
Today, Timea Ivanyi, a Ph.D. student from the University of Debrecen,
Hungary, joined us again. Unfortunately she won't stay as long
as last year (8 months), but during the following 4 months, she
will be studying the chiral separation with azaCrown ethers using
capillary electrophoresis.
September 1
Vanessa Reynders, analyst at FABI, interrupted her career for
a period of 3 years, so she can full-time take care of her twins
Maria-Gabriela and Nathaniël.
Kristof Gillisjans started his job as analyst at our department,
in replacement of Vanessa.
May 1
Annie De Schrijver, analyst at FABI, started working part-time
today.
July 2
Frédéric Despagne and Betty Gherardi are the proud
parents of a son, called Raphael. Congratulations to Fredi and
Betty!
June 30
Erwin Adams obtained a postdoctoral fellowship from the Fund
for Scientific Research (FWO) and returned to the University of
Leuven, Laboratory for Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Drug Analysis
(Prof. Hoogmartens).
June 25
The Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (Fund for Scientific
Research) has prolongated the postdoc grant of Yvan Vander Heyden
for another 3 years.
June 21
Elke Van Gyseghem obtained a two-year prolongation of her IWT
(Institute for Science and Technology, a Flemish granting institute)
doctoral grant. She will continue her study of the selection of
orthogonal chromatographic systems to be used in the separation
of a drug substance and its impurities.
June 7
Ann Detroyer won 2 prices with her poster "Evaluating monolithic
columns with and without a micellar medium in a QSRR-QRAR context",
A. Detroyer, K. Reynaert, Y. Vander Heyden and D.L. Massart, at
the international symposium HPLC 2002 - June 1-7, 2002 - Montreal,
Canada. She obtained both the award for the best student poster
and the one for the best congress poster. Congratulations Ann!
May
Dr. R. De Maesschalck is the proud father of Manu, a brother
for Amber. Congratulations to Roy and Margreet!
May 31
Today Vera Pravdova obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences
with the thesis on "N-Way Analysis in data processing".
May 24
Qian Guo obtained her Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences with the
thesis on "Dimension Reduction in Data Mining".
May 15
Qing-Song Xu, from Hunan University, P.R.China, College of Econometrics
and Mathematics, has joined the laboratory for a stay of at least
one year. He will work on multivariate calibration and nonparameter
methods in quantitative structure-activity (retention) relationships
in chemometrics.
April 1
Our laboratory is one of the eleven partners of the European
Union project entitled "Establishing of a data bank (DB)
for analytical parameters for wines from third countries".
This EU Wine DB project is funded by the European Commission and
will be coordinated by the Bundesinstitut für Gesundheitlichen
Verbraucherschutz und Veterinaermedizin (BIGVV, Berlin).
February
On March 1 FABI starts with a virtual institute, the "Virtual
Institute for Chemometrics and Industrial Metrology (VICIM)",
sponsored by the "Competitive and Sustainable Growth"
programme of The European Community. A grant of 2,2 million Euro
was obtained. Partners are Dr. R. Bro, Prof. P. Minkkinen, Prof.
M. Feinberg, Dr. J. Von Frese, Prof. L. Buydens, Prof. O. Kvalheim,
Prof. J. Zupan, Prof. X. Rius, Prof. R. Todeschini, Prof. L. Danielsson,
Dr. A. Van der Veen and Dr. S. Ellison.
January 3
Catherine Perrin obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences
with the thesis on "Method development and enhancement of
quality of chiral separations". The use of wavelets for signal
denoising in capillary electrophoresis was studied in a chapter
of her thesis.
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2001
December 22
Nele Matthijs obtained a two-year IWT (Institute for Science
and Technology, a Flemish granting institute) doctoral grant.
The project, performed in cooperation with Sanofi-Synthelabo Recherche
(Toulouse) involves the development of a knowledge-based system
(KBS) to guide the analyst in chiral separations.
December 17
We have obtained a 3 year project from the Ministry of the Flemish
Community (Department of Scientific, Technical and Cultural Affairs)
for bilateral (international) scientific and technological cooperation
with Hungary, entitled "Rational use of existing and new
methodologies in separation techniques". The Belgian partners
are Prof. J. Hoogmartens (Pharmaceutical Chemistry and Drug analysis,
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) and Prof. G. Baron (Department
of Chemical Engineering, Vrije Universiteit Brussel). The international
partners are Prof. B. Noszal (Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry,
Faculty of Pharmacy, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary)
and Prof. I. Lazar (Department of Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry,
Faculty of Science, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary).
December 13
Carine Vannecke obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences
with the thesis on "Development of generic Flow Injection
Analysis methods". From January she will work at the RIZIV
as evaluator.
October 8
Ivana Stanimirova joined us today to start a Ph D thesis. She
obtained the degree of Master of Science in Chemistry at the University
"St.Kliment Ohridski" in Sofia, Bulgaria. The research
topic of Ivana will be environmental data mining.
October 1
Debby Mangelings, Anne-Marie van Nederkassel and Raf Put joined
our laboratory to start a Ph.D. thesis. They all obtained a degree
of pharmacist in June at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Debby
will start up a new project that involves developing chiral separations
with capillary electrochromatography. The research topic of Anne-Marie
will be the development of fast chromatographic separations on
monolithic columns. Finally Raf's Ph D will be about QSRR.
September 19
Dr. Jose Torres Lapasio, who did a post-doc at FABI, has been
selected as research scientist to the "Ramon y Cajal"
program.
July 9
Frédéric Estienne found a new job at L'Oréal
May 18
Frédéric Estienne has accepted a job offer from
the French instrument manufacturer Jobin Yvon. He will take up
his position on 18 June and defend his PhD thesis on "New
trends in Multivariate Calibration and Multivariate Analysis"
later in the year.
April
Professor Massart was invited by Professor Yizeng Liang to the
Central South China University at Chang Sha, where he was appointed
honorary professor.
April 23
Professor Massart gave the first lecture for the Francqui chair
which was awarded to him by the Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
April 27
- Dr. Kris De Braekeleer left the laboratory. He will start a
job as head of laboratory at the APB (Algemene Pharmaceutische
Bond), the Belgian Pharmacists Association.
- Edelgard Hund left the laboratory. She starts to work at the
department for technology exploitation and licenses at Fraunhofer
Patentstelle in Munich, Germany. The Fraunhofer Patentstelle is
the central body for technology transfer and patents of the Fraunhofer
Gesellschaft. It is also occupied with intellectual property of
the German universities.
- Alzbeta Brozakova from the Institute of Chemical Technology
in Prague, Dept. Analytical Chemistry, left FABI after a stay
of 3 months during which she worked on her diploma thesis.
April 4
Dr. Wen Wu was appointed as Head of Toxicometrics in GlaxoSmithKline,
Welwyn, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom
February 28
Timea Ivanyi left our lab after a stay of 8 months. She returned
to the University of Debrecen, Hungary to continu her Ph.D. work.
February 10
Professor Beata Walczak is back at FABI for her yearly's six
months' stay.
February 3
- Ling JIN, arrived at FABI. She comes from the Institute of
Applied Chemistry in the Nanchang University of China. She obtained
her Master degree at the Nanchang University in 1997, where she
is a teacher now. She will stay for one year and is working on
outlier detection.
- Alzbeta Brozakova from the Institute of Chemical Technology
in Prague, Dept. Analytical Chemistry, arrived at FABI to work
on her diploma thesis for 3 months. She is a student of Prof.
M. Suchanek. Her thesis is about the validation of a method for
the determination of metals in crude oil by ICP-MS and pattern
recognition, using multivariate data measured in Prague (metal
contents in different crude oil samples). After obtaining her
master degree, she will probably start working at the Czech Metrology
Institute in Prague.
January 16
Raul F. Conde started PhD studies at FABI. He obtained his Diploma
in Chemical Engineering at National Autonomous University of Mexico
(UNAM). Before joining us he was a beginner teacher at UNAM. His
research subject will initially be about Methods for Regression
Analysis With Censored Data.
Back to top
2000
December 15
- Elke Van Gyseghem obtained a two-year IWT (Institute for Science
and Technology, a Flemish granting institute) doctoral grant (which
can be expanded to four years). She will study the selection of
orthogonal chromatographic systems to be used in the separation
of a drug substance and its impurities.
- The same IWT has given a one-year prolongation of a postdoctoral
grant to Erwin Adams, a pharmacist who obtained his PhD at the
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He will continue to investigate
how to test the equivalence of dissolution curves, using among
others multivariate and ANOVA-based (so called longitudinal) methods.
December 5
Pieter Vankeerberghen left UCB and is now working at the Farmaceutische
Inspectie.
October 1
Elke Van Gijseghem and Nele Matthijs joined our laboratory to
start a Ph.D. thesis. Both are pharmacists who obtained their
degree in June at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. The research
topic of Elke will be the selection of orthogonal chromatographic
systems to be used in the separation of a drug substance and its
impurities. Nele will work on the set-up and programming of a
knowledge-based system for chiral separations, while on the experimental
level she will do a number of case studies in RP-HPLC in order
to define a strategy for chiral separations with that technique.
November 5
Dr. A. Candolfi is the proud mother of Tim Luca. Congratulations
to Andrea and René!
November 1
Sébastien Gourvenec started work on his PhD. He studied
at the University of Brest and worked during 8 months at Elf-Atochem.
His PhD will be about chemometrics applied in process analysis.
September 10
Dr. R. De Maesschalck is the proud father of Amber. Congratulations
to Roy and Margreet!
September 1
Michal Daszykowski joined our laboratory. He obtained his master
degree at the University of Katowice and will do the work for
his PhD in our group before returning to his mother university
to obtain the degree.
September 29
A chapter entitled "Optimization strategies for HPLC and
CZE" by Y. Vander Heyden, C. Perrin and D.L. Massart was
published in the book "Handbook of Analytical Separations:
Separation Methods in Drug Synthesis and Purification" edited
by K. Valkó. Other chapters of the book related to research
done at FABI are
- Comparison of various modes and phase systems for analytical
HPLC, by P. Jandera
- Fast generic HPLC methods, by I.M. Mutton
- Recent developments in liquid chromatographic enantioseparation,
by M. Lämmerhofer and W. Lindner
- Recent advances in quantitative structure-retention relationships
(QSRR), by R. Kalisza
A copy of the book will be available in our library.
September 29
Anh Nguyen Minh Nguyet left our laboratory. She will continue
her Ph. D. in Germany at the dept. of Prof. S. Gäb, Bergische
Universität, Gesamthochschule Wuppertal, Analytical Chemistry,
Gauss-Strasse 20, D-42097 Wuppertal. The subject of her research
will be "Optimization of separation and detection of fatty
acids and fatty-acid hydroperoxides by CE and HPLC".
July 1
Timea Ivanyi from the University of Debrecen, Hungary, Faculty
of Science, Department of Inorganic and Analytical Chemistry,
Laboratory of Macrocycles has joined the laboratory for a stay
of 8 months. She has a grant from the Flemish Community within
the program for Bilateral Scientific and Technological Cooperation
(BWTS). She is a doctoral student of Prof. I. Lazar. She works
on the synthesis and application of macrocycles in Analytical
Chemistry. In our lab she will work on the possible applications
of macrocycles in capillary electrophoresis and on the characterization
of stationary phases in HPLC.
June 16
Siriporn Kuttatharmmakul obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical
Sciences with the thesis on "Better practices in method validation
and in the analysis of censored data". She will go back to
her old job: Head of Analytical method development section, Quality
Assurance Division, The Government Pharmaceutical Organization
(GPO), Rama 6 Road, Rajthevee, Bangkok, Thailand.
June 5
On Friday 16 June 2000 at 3 p.m. Siriporn Kuttatharmmakul will
defend her thesis on "Better practices in method validation
and in the analysis of censored data".
May 22
- Professor Lutgarde Buydens received on 22 May the Christopher
Plantin award from the hands of the governor of the province of
Antwerp. The award is given to a Belgian who has distinguished
her/himself in another country. Professor Buydens obtained her
PhD in our laboratory.
- Roy De Maesschalck the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences with
the thesis on "Chemometric Characterisation of Pharmaceutical
Substances and Products". He is now doing postdoctoral research
at Janssen Pharmaceutica.
May 15
- Professor Beata Walczak's book on Wavelets is available. Reference:
"Wavelets in chemistry", Elsevier, Amsterdam (2000).
- Dr. V. Centner is the proud father of twins, Vaclav and Radmila.
Congratulations to Vita and Radmila Centner!
- On 19 May 2000 at 4.30 p.m. Roy De Maesschalck will defend his
thesis on "Chemometric Characterisation of Pharmaceutical
Substances and Products"
February 1
Frédéric Despagne obtained the Ph D in Applied
Sciences with the thesis "Development and transfer of multivariate
calibration models using artificial neural networks". Frédéric
now has a position at Eutech (Lavera - France) where he will work
on NIR technology implementation.
January 10
On 1 February 2000 at 4 p.m. Frédéric Despagne
will defend his thesis on "Development and transfer of multivariate
calibration models using artificial neural networks". (Aud.
Piet Brouwer - Jette)
Back to top
1999
December 16
- The IWT (Institute for Science and Technology, a Flemish granting
institute) has given a two year PhD grant (which can be expanded
to four years) to Ann Detroyer. She will study the potential of
micellar chromatography as a model for drug absorption through
cell membranes.
- The same IWT has given a one year postdoctoral grant (which
can be expanded to two years) to Erwin Adams, a pharmacist who
obtained his PhD at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He will
investigate how to test the equivalence of dissolution curves,
using among others multivariate and ANOVA-based (so called longitudinal)
methods.
December 14
We have obtained a grant for a project on "Standards and
recommendations for estimating the uncertainty of analytical measurements"
from the Federal Government (Department of Scientific, Technical
and Cultural Affairs) together with Professor Crommen from the
University of Liège and Professor Hoogmartens from the
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. More details later...
December 1
- Dr Jiri Pazourek from the Masaryk University in Brno has joined
the laboratory for a stay of 8 months with a grant from the Federal
Services for Scientific Research. He is a specialist of capillary
zone electrophoresis and will work in this area with us.
- The Flemish Fund for Scientific research has extended the Wetenschappelijke
Onderzoeksgemeenschap (Scientific research network) for Chemometrics
for another five years. Our laboratory chaires this network. It
consists of Flemish chemometricians such as Piet Van Espen and
Paul Lewi, statisticians such as Professors Rousseeuw and Beirlant
and colleagues, that apply chemometrics such as Professors Belpaire
(pharmacology, Ghent), Hoogmartens (pharmaceutical analysis, Leuven),
Remon (pharmaceutical technology, Ghent), De Leenheer (toxicology,
Ghent), Francois (radiochemistry, Limburg), Vereecken (metallurgy,
Brussels). There are also colleagues from the french speaking
universities (Professors Crommen from Liege and Tilquin from Louvain),
Belgians residing in foreign countries (Professors Buydens, Nijmegen;
Coomans, Townsville; Geladi, Umea) and a few foreign colleagues
(Professors Forina, Genua; Kvalheim, Bergen; Rius, Taragonna;
Sjostrom, Umea; Zupan, Ljubljana). The network funds networking
activities, but there is also a possibility to apply for grants
for young postsdocs to come and work for 6 months in one of the
Flemish groups named).
- The faculty of engineering of our university has accepted the
thesis of Frédéric Despagne, entitled Development
and transfer of multivariate calibration models using artificial
neural networks. The thesis will be publicly defended on february
1. Frédéric is now working for Eutech, which develops
and commercialises the TOPNIR software.
November 24
We learned with pleasure that Beata Walczak has been promoted
by the Silesian University of Katowice, Poland to Professor. Congratulations!
We expect Professor Walczak to spend another six months with us
next year.
November 22
Yan Chungli has joined us from the PR China. She will prepare
a master thesis to obtain the degree of master in Medical and
Pharmaceutical Research. The subject of the thesis is the determination
of histamine in foods and biological samples.
October 1
Jan Luypaert joined us today. He obtained his degree in pharmacy
at the VUB and starts with a PhD on NIR applied to semi solid
samples such as creams and ointments.
October 1
Today Vera Pravdova, who obtained her master degree at the University
of Pardubice (Czech Republic) starts officially working with us.
She has a Ph D grant and will work on applications of methods
for N-way analysis.
September 27
Nguyen Minh Nguyet Anh (called Anh) from Vietnam has rejoined
us. She obtained her master degree in Medical and Pharmaceutical
Research at the VUB, Brussels last June. She has been working
in the optimisation of Flow Injection Analysis methods. She now
started a Ph D thesis on the development and validation of HPLC
methods on short columns. The field of application that was chosen
is the analysis of antioxydants in food stuffs.
September 27
Yinghua Hu has joined us from the PR China. He will prepare here
a master thesis to obtain the degree of master in informatics.
The object of the thesis is, first to prepare a user friendly
software for robustness testing and, in a second stage, to make
this software available on the Internet, coupled to guidelines,
written by Yvan Vander Heyden and A. Nijhuis (formerly with Unilever
Research at Vlaardingen) in the course of an earlier SMT project
on Robust Process Analysis.
September 27
The EU will fund a three-year project on N-way methods for product
quality control and process analysers applied to batch processes.
The partners in this project are Elf Antar France (dr. P. Ricoux
- Centre de Recherche de Solaize), The Royal Veterinary and Agricultural
University of Denmark (Dept. of dr. C. Andersson) and the VUB.
According to the wishes of the EU, the project will be linked
to the ChemoAC activities. The aim of the project is the following:
" The objective is to enhance the information from multivariate
(e.g. spectroscopic) process analysers by including the necessary
intelligence to control or help control batch pocesses where many
measured parameters (e.g. spectral profiles) are followed over
time for different batches. This entails the development of N-way
monitoring techniques for the modelling of product quality. There
is no generic approach to the use of such methods in a practical
context. It is the objective to develop such a methodology and
in particular, to make it such that it can be used by plant operators.
This means that the mathematical results such as loading plots
should be translated in easily interpretable process information
such as that e.g. the end point of the batch has been reached
or that abnormal fluctuations are occuring and, as much as possible,
what the reason of the fluctuation is and finally what are the
proposed corrections."
September 23
Kris De Braekeleer obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences
with the thesis on "Multivariate techniques for purity assessment
and pharmaceutical reaction monitoring".
July 9
- Andrea Candolfi obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences
with the thesis on Direct identification of pharmaceutical products
by Near-Infrared spectroscopy combined with Pattern recognition
methods. She is now doing postdoctoral research at Novartis in
Basel.
- The reading committee accepted Kris De Braekeleer's Ph D thesis
on "Multivariate techniques for purity assessment and pharmaceutical
reaction monitoring". The date of the public defense of his
thesis will be announced on this page.
June 30
- The Fonds voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (Fund for Scientific
Research) has awarded a postdoc position for 3 years to Yvan Vander
Heyden.
- The Ph D defense of Andrea Candolfi will take place on 8 July
at 5 p.m.
May 19
On October 1 Roy De Maesschalck, who by then will have submitted
his PhD will take up a postdoc position at Janssen Pharmaceutics
May 19
On July 1 Frédéric Despagne will leave us. He has
accepted a position at the CRIT research centre of Rhône-Poulenc,
where he will work in the Service Ingénierie et Procédés.
May 14
The services of the Prime Minister (scientific, technical and
cultural affairs) have awarded us a grant to be used for financing
8 months the stay of dr. J. Pazourek (laboratory of Professor
Havel, Brno, Czech Republic), a specialist in capillary zone electrophoresis.
May 11
The reading committee accepted Andrea Candolfi's Ph D thesis
on Direct identification of pharmaceutical products by Near-Infrared
spectroscopy combined with Pattern recognition methods. She will
soon defend her thesis publicly. The date will be announced on
this page.
April 24
Professor Massart was appointed (corresponding) member of the
Koninklijke Academie voor Geneeskunde (Royal Academy of Medecine).
March 1
Twenty years:
This is the time Katrien Decq is with us. Katrien, thank you for
all you did for the lab and stay with us for many more years!
February 15
Beata is back!
Dr. Beata Walczak (Silesian University of Katowice, Poland) has
rejoined the laboratory for another 6 month period.
February 8
Professor V. Simeonov (University of Sofia, Bulgaria) rejoined
the Laboratory for a stay of nine months with a grant from "Research
in Brussels", an initiative of the "Brussels Hoofdstedelijk
Gewest".
February 5
Pierluigi (Gigi) Barbieri, who spent six months at our lab, obtained
his PhD at the Universita degli Studi di Trieste with a thesis
entitled "Chemometric investigations on the water body of
the Venezia Giulia" (Promotor: Prof. L. Favretto, advisors:
Prof. E. Reisenhofer and Prof. D.L. Massart)
February 4
Pieter Vankeerberghen obtained the Ph D in Pharmaceutical Sciences.
The title of the doctoral work is: "Development and Implementation
of a Run Suitability System for Graphite Furnace Atomic Absorption
Spectrometry - Extension to other techniques". Pieter is
now working for UCB.