Jan Hendrik Jozef Hoeijmakers (born 15 March in 1951 in Sevenum) is a Dutch molecular biologist, biochemist, and molecular geneticist.

Education and career

Hoeijmakers studied biology from 1969 at Radboud University Nijmegen with a master's degree in 1975 in molecular biology (with a focus on biochemistry and genetics). At the University of Amsterdam he completed course work from 1975 to 1979 for a doctorate in molecular medicine and then was a lecturer in the department of microbiology from 1979 to 1981. He received his doctorate in 1981 from the University of Amsterdam (with a complete publication list) under

Piet Borst Piet may refer to: People *Piet (given name), a common name in the Netherlands and South Africa *Henri Piet (1888–1915), French lightweight boxer *Tony Piet (1906–1981), American Major League Baseball player Schools *Purushottam Institute of ...

with dissertation '' Trypanosomes: Kinetoplast DNA and Antigenic Variation ''. At Erasmus University Rotterdam, as a member of

Dirk Bootsma Dirk Bootsma (23 May 1936 – 5 October 2020) was a Dutch geneticist. He was a professor at the Erasmus University Rotterdam between 1969 and 2002. He and his research group discovered the cause of chronic myelogenous leukemia and furthered the un ...

's group in the Institute of Genetics, Hoeijmakers was, in the department of cell biology and genetics, a senior scientist from 1981 to 1985, an associate professor from 1985 to 1993, and a professor of molecular genetics from 1993 to the present. The

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...

sponsored him as an Academy Professor from 2011 to 2016. He is the author or co-author of over 490 scientific publications. He has served on the editorial boards of five scientific journals. In 1983 he received the Harold-Quintus-Bosz Prize for his dissertation, in which he clarified the molecular mechanism of the antigen variation of

trypanosomes Trypanosomatida is a group of kinetoplastid excavates distinguished by having only a single flagellum. The name is derived from the Greek ''trypano'' (borer) and ''soma'' (body) because of the corkscrew-like motion of some trypanosomatid species. ...

. He uncovered the structure and main function of the network

mitochondrial DNA Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA or mDNA) is the DNA located in mitochondria, cellular organelles within eukaryotic cells that convert chemical energy from food into a form that cells can use, such as adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Mitochondrial D ...

of the parasite. He also clarified the complex genetic mechanism by which trypanosomes constantly change their surface antigens in order to escape the immune system. In Rotterdam in the early 1980s he achieved the first cloning of human genes responsible for DNA repair and discovered a strong evolutionary stability of the DNA repair system. He clarified the mechanism of

nucleotide excision repair Nucleotide excision repair is a DNA repair mechanism. DNA damage occurs constantly because of chemicals (e.g. intercalating agents), radiation and other mutagens. Three excision repair pathways exist to repair single stranded DNA damage: Nucle ...

(NER) and associated hereditary diseases ( xeroderma pigmentosum,

Cockayne syndrome Cockayne syndrome (CS), also called Neill-Dingwall syndrome, is a rare and fatal autosomal recessive neurodegenerative disorder characterized by growth failure, impaired development of the nervous system, abnormal sensitivity to sunlight (photosen ...

, trichothiodystrophy). He found with Jean-Marc Egly that Transcription Factor II H (TF_IIH) opens the DNA for the start of the NER. Homeijmakers was elected in 2000 a member of the

(section ‘Medicine’, dept. ‘Physics’). (with list of 5 key publications) In 2013 he was appointed a Knight in the Order of the Netherlands Lion for important research in cancer and aging. He received in 1986 the Snoo van t’Hoogerhuys Prize (for the isolation of the first human gene for DNA repair) and in 1995 the Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine (jointly with Dirk Bootsma for their research on DNA repair). (in French) In 1995 Hoeijmakers was elected a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO). He received in 1998 the Spinoza Prize, the highest Dutch science award. (in Dutch) He received in 2000 both the Van Gogh award from the ''Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek'' (NWO) (''i.e.'' Dutch Organization for Science) and the Descartes-Huygens award for French-Dutch scientific collaborations and in 2001 the Josephine Nefkens Prize for Cancer Research. In 2008 the

European Research Council The European Research Council (ERC) is a public body for funding of scientific and technological research conducted within the European Union (EU). Established by the European Commission in 2007, the ERC is composed of an independent Scientific ...

awarded him an Advanced Grant. In 2011 he received the Queen Wilhelmina Research Award from the Dutch Society for Cancer Research and, with Bert Vogelstein, the Charles Rodolphe Brupbacher Prize for Cancer Research for research on genome stability and its role in aging and cancer. In 2017 Hoeijmakers received the International Prize of the Olav Thon Foundation.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hoeijmakers, Jan Biogerontologists Dutch molecular biologists Dutch biochemists Dutch geneticists Radboud University Nijmegen alumni University of Amsterdam alumni Academic staff of Erasmus University Rotterdam Knights of the Order of the Netherlands Lion Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Spinoza Prize winners People from Limburg (Netherlands) 1951 births Living people