Dr. M. (Marian) Beekman

I studied Biomedical Sciences and my PhD thesis was about the genetics of risk factors of cardiovascular disease. Since then I am studying factors promoting human heathspan. My research consists of etiological research for the mechanisms of ageing and longevity, development of biomarkers for vulneBecause ageing is a risk factor for age-related disease such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and osteoarthritis, I am very interested in the main underlying mechanisms of ageing. To identify the drivers of ageing we need much trability and disease risk in general, and studies for the health benefits of a combined lifestyle intervention in older people. I frequently collaborate with cohort studies from the Netherlands Cohorts Consortium (NCC), and with lifestyle intervention studies from the Universities of Wageningen and Maastricht. I am the PI of the Leiden Longevity Study and he GOTO lifestyle intervention study. I promote Open Science and making research data available. Therefore I am involved in national research infrastructures such as Health-RI (LUMC node), ODISSEI and NCC.

Because ageing is a risk factor for age-related disease such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and osteoarthritis, I am very interested in the main underlying mechanisms of ageing. To identify the drivers of ageing we need much translational research linking fundamental research to epidemiology, which is consecutively linked to implementation into clinical care and the population at large (LEGend, Prevention & Lifestyle). This is why I am board member of the Dutch Society for Research on Ageing (DuSRA). Our studies on familial longevity showed us that there are people, often clustered in families, that are healthy for a very long time. It is possible to be healthy for longer than 60 years. I would love to discover what factors in such long-lived families contribute to their extended healthspan. To do so, I enthusiastically make us of their biomaterial on which multi-omics data is generated, such as gene expression, DNA methylation, circulating metabolites and proteins.