Scientific projects evoke a lot of creativity. They result in pictures, video's, drawings, illustrations and visualizations, some of which can be inspiring, or simply enjoyable to see. A large part of this creative content does not end up in scientific publications. In order to share this with you, I created this online project gallery.

The name of this website includes my initials 'BW' or 'Bregje Willemijn'. This is what I write on my tubes, bags, vials, boxes, and any other materials I use in the lab. Hence, this is how others recognize my work-in-progress. That's why I decided to leave this trace here too.

The topics of the content change slightly over the years, as does my research. Nevertheless, aquatic biology is at the core of all of the projects:

Project overview

2017-2022, Ph.D. project, Institute of Environmental Sciences, Leiden University

For my Ph.D., I studied how colonizing microbiota affect the toxicity of nanomaterials to microbially-colonized hosts. The focus of this work was twofold. Firstly, interactions between microbes and particles that can potentially affect the fate and biodistribution of nanoparticles were studied. Secondly, interactions between hosts and microbiota that can shape the host its response to toxic nanomaterials were studied, and the underlying toxicity mechanisms were explored. To do so, a combination of zebrafish larvae experiments and computational methods was used. My Ph.D. project was part of the EU funded H2020 project PATROLS: 'Physiologically Anchored Tools for Realistic nanOmateriaL hazard aSsessment'.

• Title:'Nanomaterial safety for microbially-colonized hosts: microbiota-mediated physisorption interactions and particle-specific toxicity'

  Dissertation | Propositions | Defense | Data

• Title:'Predicted adsorption affinity for enteric microbial metabolites to metal and carbon nanomaterials'

  Research article

• Title:'Microbiota-dependent TLR2 signaling reduces silver nanoparticle toxicity to zebrafish larvae'

  Research article | Project movie | Visualization of dead and life microbes on a zebrafish egg

• Title:'Colonizing microbiota protect zebrafish larvae against silver nanoparticle toxicity'

  Research article | Project movie | Visualization of dead and life microbes on a zebrafish egg

• Title:'Adsorption of titanium dioxide nanoparticles onto zebrafish eggs affects colonizing microbiota'

  Research article | Visualization of dead and life microbes on a zebrafish egg

• Title:'Plastic particles adsorb to the roots of freshwater vascular plant Spirodela polyrhiza but do not impair growth'

  Research article | Gif of nanoplastics on duckweed

2014-2016, Master Limnology and Oceanography, University of Amsterdam

• Title:'Benthic hotspots in the pelagic zone: aggregation of microalgae to suspended particles in an oligotrophic delta lake'

  Internship at the Department of Aquatic Environmental Ecology (AEE, IBED, UvA) in collaboration with the Department of Ecosystem and Sediment Dynamics, Deltares; 2016.

  Abstract | Research article | ISME16 Poster | Interactive visualization of an aggregate | Video of tracking settling aggregates

• Title: 'Stony teamwork: the holobiont facilitated adaptive potential of scleractinian biocalcification to ocean acidification'

  Literature Review at the Computational Science Lab (CSL, IVI, UvA); 2015.

  Abstract

• Title:'Risky protection: the role of the cyanotoxin microcystin under extreme oxidative stress'

  Internship at the Department of Aquatic Microbiology (AMB, IBED, UvA); 2015.

  Abstract | Research article

2011-2014, Bachelor Biology, Leiden University

• Title:'Speciation in progress: looking for cryptic species in pontoniine shrimps'

  Internship at the Department of Marine Zoology, Naturalis Biodiversity Center; 2014.

  Abstract | Research article