Prof. dr. B.T. (Bas) Heijmans

I am professor of Biomedical Data Sciences and focus on Population Epigenomics. It is my drive is to understand how the regulation of our genome is tuned by both environmental signals and genetic make-up, and the impact this process has on our health throughout life. In my role as scientific coordinator of the LUMC-wide research theme Medical Genomics, I am a member of the Research Council. I was appointed as Established Investigator by the Dutch Heart Foundation.

My research focuses on the discovery of changes in epigenomic regulation that are induced by the environment and genetic variation, and subsequently affect cardiometabolic health and healthy ageing. To this end, my group performs genome-scale analyses of natural variation in population studies, including (monochorionic) twins, long-lived families and individuals who were exposed to the Dutch Famine at the end of WW2. To maximize biological insight from these studies, my group develops methodology and software tools, integrates epigenomics data with interconnected omics layers (e.g. genome and transcriptome), addresses the biological role of DNA methylation, and, more recently, applies both causal inference methods and experimental cell models to uncover causal epigenomic mechanisms. The long-term perspective of the research is to spur on the development of personalized medicine.