Netherlands Metabolomics Centre

Creating a world class metabolomics knowledge infrastructure to improve personal health and quality of life.

With rapid advancements in scientific research spanning disciplines from medicine to agriculture to nutrition, researchers across the world have begun to see the benefits of metabolomic technologies for unlocking the secrets of living processes. These metabolic processes are the core of physiology, and as a result, research demands for the development of metabolomic technologies from academia and industry alike have seen a dramatic rise that continues to grow exponentially.

The Netherlands Metabolomics Centre (NMC) brings together the vast knowledge and extensive expertise of the Dutch genomics and life sciences community to develop the technologies that will meet these demands.

Through active community building and collaboration within the field, the NMC functions as a transparent and open centre, actively promoting the transfer of knowledge and technology in the field of metabolomics through a network of committed partners. Together, the NMC team confronts the challenges of metabolomics research and develop the tools and strategies needed most by the Dutch and international research community.

Read more in the NMC publication: "Develop technology, understand biology, improve health"

Mission

The mission of the Netherlands Metabolomics Centre is the creation of a world-class metabolomics knowledge infrastructure to improve personal health and quality of life.

Operating as a multidisciplinary, public-private research consortium, the NMC serves as a focal point for communication and education concerning the potential and benefits of metabolomics to science and society in general.

About NMC

The Netherlands Metabolomics Centre (NMC) is a place of collaboration, where existing knowledge and expertise of NGI consortia, industry, research institutes, and individual research groups in the medical, plant science, and microbial fields are combined for technology development and application. In this coordinated effort, the NMC is focussing on the development of standardised and validated technological tools and instruments that can be applied in new strategies for Dutch industry and academia, and clinical centre's.

By forming direct links with the Genomics Centres of Excellence , the NMC ensures maximum transfer of technologies to end-user biologists. Together, these combined efforts will work to retain the Netherlands’ prominent position at the forefront of metabolomic research and technology development.

What is Metabolomics

Much like genomics aims to unravel the structure of the genome, metabolomics focuses on understanding the many small molecule metabolites that result from a cell’s metabolic processes.

There are an estimated 5,000 - 20,000 endogenous human metabolites, and analysing their production gives an accurate picture of the physiology of a cell at a given moment in time. Whereas the cell’s genotype can predict its physiology to a limited extent, metabolomics also takes phenotype – and therefore environmental conditions – into account, allowing a more precise measure of actual cell physiology.

For research, the study of metabolomics provides the means to measure the effects of a variety of stimuli on individual cells, tissues, and bodily fluids.

By studying how their metabolic profiles change with the introduction of chemicals or the expression of known genes, for example, researchers can more effectively study the immediate impact of disease, nutrition, pharmaceutical treatment, and genetic modifications while using a systems biology approach.

Organisation

Management Team
The Management Team is responsible for the day-to-day management of the Consortium, for liaising with NGI, and for implementing the NMC Programme and the decisions made by the Executive Committee.

The Management Team consists of:

Prof.dr. Thomas Hankemeier - Scientific Director
Drs. Merlijn van Rijswijk - Managing Director
Cobi Deurloo - Office Manager (+31 71 527 1868, j.m.deurloo@lacdr.leidenuniv.nl)

Executive Committee

The Executive Committee is the highest executive body of the NMC and is responsible for the implementation of the overall NMC programme and the operational, administrative and financial management of NMC. The Executive Committee is constituted of the Research Committee and the Management Team.

The Executive Committee consists of:

Prof. dr. Thomas Hankemeier (Leiden University)
Drs. Merlijn van Rijswijk - Chairman (Leiden University)
Prof. dr. Age Smilde (University of Amsterdam)
Dr. Ric de Vos, (Plant Research International, Wageningen University)
Prof. dr. Boudewijn Burgering (UMC Utrecht)
Dr. Ben van Ommen (TNO)
Dr. John van Duynhoven (Unilever)
Dr. Marcel van Tilborg (DSM)

Supervisory Board

The Supervisory Board is the highest governing body and is responsible for supervising the activities of NMC and supporting the Executive Committee in its decision making. Periodically, the Supervisory Board shall assess the performance of the Executive Committee. The Supervisory Board is drawn from high level representatives of Members and completed by one or more external experts. The director of the Netherlands Genomics Initiative (NGI), is invited as observer in the meetings of the Supervisory Board.

The Supervisory Board consists of:

Prof. dr. Rob Hamer Unilever (Chairman)
Dr. Ton Rijnders MSD
Prof.dr. Wim Saris DSM
Prof.dr. Ton J. Rabelink LUMC
Dr. Robert Hall PRI
Prof.dr. Jan van der Greef TNO
Dr. Ysbrand Poortman European patient org
Dr. C. Laane NGI (Observer)

Netherlands Genomics Initiative

Excellence in -omics, benefits for society
Excellent research, state-of-the-art technology infrastructure, societal embedding of genomics and a stimulating environment for research talent remain key elements of the NGI strategy. The main shift in focus is towards valorisation, i.e., creating added value from genomics research and application gets top priority during the period 2008-2012.

NGI creates societal and economic value from genomics through a network of large-scale Genomics Centres that work on targeted programmes. These centres are consortiums of universities, research institutes, industry and societal organisations.

The Genomics Centres cover the complete chain from basic science to applied research, development and finally valorisation of the results. Societal embedding and creating new economic activity is an integral part of the programme of each consortium.

Part of Netherlands Genomics Initiative
NMC is part of the national genomics strategy implemented through the Netherlands Genomics Initiative (NGI) and is its Technology Centre of excellence for Metabolomics.

The genomics Centres of Excellence are:

(CBSG) Centre for BioSystems Genomics
(CMSB) Centre for Medical Systems Biology
(CGC) Cancer Genomics Centre
(Kluyver centre) Kluyver Centre for Genomics of Industrial Fermentation
(CSG) Centre for Society and Genomics
(NBIC) Netherlands BioInformatics Centre
(NPC) Netherlands Proteomics Centre
(CDC) Celiac Disease Consortium
(Ecogenomics) Ecogenomics Consortium
(NGC) Nutrigenomics Consortium
(VIRGO) VIRGO Consortium
(NTC) Netherlands Toxicogenomics Centre
(FGCN) Forensic Genomics Consortium Netherlands
(NCHA) Netherlands Consortium for Healthy Ageing
(NCSB) Netherlands Consortium for Systems Biology
(NMC) Netherlands Metabolomics Centre
(NTC) Netherlands Toxicogenomics Centre