Resume

Contents

IMGP5427_1000Objective
Skills
Research and education
Work experience
Organizational experience
Interests
Programming languages
Software
Languages
Publications
Web presence

Objective

I want to use my skills, experience and creativity on relevant and complex problems that tickle my imagination.

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Skills

  • Research: a PhD project is a training in asking creative questions, designing experiments, testing ideas, carefully analyzing observations and presenting the results. Where in academia research is often more about the journey than the goal, I would like to be more focussed on results.
  • Organization: I have always tried to be active in making my (work) environment a better place. I learned to lead people, to organize efficient meetings and to make a realistic planning. To get results I believe it is important to maintain a good working atmosphere in the team and I try to bring out the best in other team members.
  • Programming: extensive experience in using Python, LabView, Objective-C/Cocoa and others is useful for a wide range of tasks. For my research project I integrated hardware and software in a single LabView program, making it easy to control the optical setup from a computer. Python scripts were used to process the data. As a hobby I see programming as an intellectual challenge that can be used to satisfy my curiosities.

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Research and Education

PhD student Ultrafast Vibrational Spectroscopy
University of Zurich, Switzerland

  • PhD defense was on September 24, 2013
  • Using ultrafast infrared spectroscopy we studied the dynamics of biomolecular systems
  • Responsibilities:
    • Redesigning and rebuilding an advanced optical (2D-IR) setup:
      • Experience with (among others) ultrafast laser systems, IR and visible light sensors and detectors, optics, optoelectronics, electronics and actuators
      • An animation of the 2D-IR setup can be found on Vimeo
    • Writing software to control the setup and to analyze the data
    • Preparing and measuring samples
    • Analyzing and interpreting the results
    • Scientific writing (list with journal articles)
    • Oral presentations at the Swiss Chemical Society (SCS) 2011
    • Poster presentations at the Coherent Multidimensional Spectroscopy (CMDS) in Minneapolis (2010) and Berlin (2012)
    • Teaching practical and theoretical courses to students:
      • General practicum chemistry (1st and 2nd semester students)
      • Physical chemistry II, exercises and practicum (4th semester students)

Bachelor and Master of Science in Chemistry
University of Groningen, the Netherlands

  • Specialization in physical and theoretical chemistry
  • Second research project in physical chemistry, University of Lund, Sweden
    • Experimental single molecule spectroscopy of aggregated molecules
    • Responsibilities included:
      • Making a procedure to make aggregates with specific sizes
      • Measuring samples, analyzing data and interpretation of the results
  • Master research project in the theoretical physics, University of Groningen
    • Numerical simulations of 2D-IR spectra
    • Responsibilities included:
      • Setting up the quantum mechanical and molecular dynamics simulations
      • Analyzing and interpretation of the results

High school, VWO-diploma
Visser ‘t Hooft Lyceum, Leiden

  • Finished with 8 subjects (7 was normal): Dutch, English, Mathematics A (statistics) and B (algebra), Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Geography.

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Work experience

Postdoctoral position 2013-2014
University of Zurich, Switzerland

  • Responsible for writing a new software to control optical setups, collect data and process measurements.
  • By eliminating software bottlenecks I managed to double the measurement rate for one setup
  • For another setup I made the software more flexible. New measurement modes can now be set in the user interface, instead of programmatically.

Student representative in the faculty board 2006 – 2007
University of Groningen, the Netherlands

  • The faculty had ~3000 students, 12 education programs and a €100 million budget. The faculty was in the middle of a reorganization and budget cuts
  • I participated in faculty board meetings and helped shape the educational policy of the faculty

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Organizational experience

Chairman ONCS-committee Groningen 2007

  • The ONCS is a two day sporting event for Dutch chemistry students, organized yearly in a different city
  • The committee (4 – 7 persons) was responsible for organizing the financing (€10,000), location, food, and activities for the 425 participants
  • We initiated the committee and made a successful pitch to organize the games
  • As chairman I represented the committee externally and I organized the meetings and the general planning internally

Various committees within the chemistry institutes of the University Zurich

  • Representative for the PhD students and postdocs during the accreditation of the chemistry institutes in 2010
    • Working with representatives and professors from different institutes and the university.
  • Organization of the graduate school retreats in 2010, 2011 and 2012
    • The retreats had 50 – 80 participants and a CHF 10,000 – 20,000 budget
    • The committee (3 – 5 persons) organized housing, food, transport and (scientific) activities
    • My responsibilities included:
      • Organization of the committee (meetings, planning)
      • Making the booklet for participants
      • Communication with professors and PhD-students

Various committees within study society De Chemische Binding (The Chemical Bond)

  • Vice-chairman of the board, responsible for selling books, keeping track of the activities calendar and relations with other study societies.
  • Member of committees organizing seminars, the website and the Christmas dinner, among others.

Various committees related to student representation at the University of Groningen

  • Faculty council
    • Students and employees checking the faculty board
    • Chairman of the education and research committee
  • Education program council (Opleidingscommissie)
    • Council where students provide feedback about current courses to improve future courses

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Interests

  • Photography: mostly as a hobby, but on several occasions I was asked to be the “official” photographer for events. My photos are regularly used as profile pictures on social networks.
  • Cooking: for special occasions I like to make Indonesian rijsttafel, a table full with a variety of dishes (although the spices are easier to buy in the Netherlands than in Switzerland).
  • Reading: now that I have finished my thesis I look forward picking up reading books again. I’m mostly interested in historical novels and detectives.

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Programming languages

LabView

  • Experienced user.
  • Used for controlling the 2D-IR setup. I was responsible for porting the old Visual Basic 6 program to LabView.

Python, Numpy and Matplotlib

Cocoa/Objective C/Swift

  • Experienced user
  • Enigma app: a simulation of the German World War II cipher machine Enigma.
  • I recently started rewriting the program in Swift… to be continued

HTML, CSS

  • Experienced user
  • My photo site is written in HTML and CSS.

Perl, Haskell

  • Beginner level
  • I know the basics, but never had a excuse project to really dive into these languages.

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Software