Barend Mons (born 1957,

The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...

) is a molecular biologist and a

FAIR data FAIR data is data which meets the FAIR principles of findability, accessibility, interoperability, and reusability (FAIR). The acronym and principles were defined in a March 2016 paper in the journal '' Scientific Data'' by a consortium of sc ...

specialist. The first decade of his scientific career he spent on fundamental research on malaria parasites and later on translational research for malaria vaccines. In the year 2000 he switched to advanced data stewardship and (biological) systems analytics. He is most known for innovations in scholarly collaboration, especially nanopublications, and knowledge graph based discovery. In 2012 Barend was appointed full Professor in biosemantics in the Department of Human Genetics at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) in The

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

. In 2014 he organised the seminal FAIR conference at the Lorentz centre that led to the FAIR data initiative and GO FAIR. In 2015 he was appointed chair of the High Level Expert Group on the European Open Science Cloud. From 2018 to 2023 Barend was the elected president of

CODATA The Committee on Data of the International Science Council (CODATA) was established in 1966 as the Committee on Data for Science and Technology, originally part of the International Council of Scientific Unions, now part of the International ...

, the affiliated organisation on research data related issues of the

International Science Council The International Science Council (ISC) is an international non-governmental organization that unites scientific bodies at various levels across the social and natural sciences. The ISC was formed with its inaugural general assembly on 4 July 20 ...

. He has also been the European representative in the Board on Research Data and Information (BRDI) of the

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM), also known as the National Academies, is a Congressional charter, congressionally chartered organization that serves as the collective scientific national academy of the Uni ...

in the USA. In 2023 he was also appointed professor at the Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research. In 2024, he was appointed as Fellow of the

. At his retirement in 2024 he was Knighted by the Dutch King in the ‘

Order of the Netherlands Lion The Order of the Netherlands Lion, also known as the Order of the Lion of the Netherlands (, ) is a Dutch honours system, Dutch order of chivalry founded by William I of the Netherlands on 29 September 1815. The Order of the Netherlands Lion wa ...

’, the oldest and highest reward for cultural and scientific contributions to the international society. Barend is a frequent keynote speaker about FAIR and open science around the world, and continues to participate in various national and international boards.

Education

Mons was awarded a Masters (1981 Cum Laude) and a PhD (1986) from

Leiden University Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; ) is a Public university, public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. Established in 1575 by William the Silent, William, Prince of Orange as a Protestantism, Protestant institution, it holds the d ...

on cellular and molecular biology of the malaria parasite '' Plasmodium berghei'', and has worked for more than ten years on the genetic differentiation of

malaria Malaria is a Mosquito-borne disease, mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects vertebrates and ''Anopheles'' mosquitoes. Human malaria causes Signs and symptoms, symptoms that typically include fever, Fatigue (medical), fatigue, vomitin ...

parasites and vaccine research, publishing over 45 research articles. Barend was one of the designers and coordinators of the transformational Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) project known as Open PHACTS, pioneering the use of semantic technologies, nanopublications and micro-attributions in pharmaceutical biomedical research. From 2013 to 2015 he acted as Head of Node of the Dutch Node in

ELIXIR An elixir is a sweet liquid used for medical purposes, to be taken orally and intended to cure one's illness. When used as a dosage form, pharmaceutical preparation, an elixir contains at least one active ingredient designed to be taken orall ...

. In 2014, he initiated the FAIR Data initiative and in 2015 he was appointed Chair of the High Level Expert Group for the European Open Science Cloud.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mons, Barend 1957 births Living people Dutch bioinformaticians Dutch molecular biologists Academic staff of Erasmus University Rotterdam Leiden University alumni Academic staff of Leiden University Scientists from The Hague