Luc Brunsveld and Marc Geers elected as members of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences

May 12, 2022

Professor in chemical biology Luc Brunsveld and professor of mechanics of materials Marc Geers will be formally inaugurated as new members of the Academy on September 12th.

Luc Brunsveld, professor of chemical biology, and Marc Geers, professor of mechanics of materials, have been elected as new members of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences (KNAW). Election to the Academy is a huge honor, given that KNAW is the most important Dutch society for top scientists. Membership within KNAW is for life, and the pair are among the 22 new members this year.

Luc Brunsveld

Luc Brunsveld (1975) has developed a unique method to study and manipulate protein complexes as composite units. His strength is that he connects synthetic and supramolecular chemistry and knows how to use these to address current biomedical challenges.

His work ranges from fundamental biophysics and mathematical concepts to the discovery of new drugs. Brunsveld is also the co-founder of an innovative biotech startup: Ambagon Therapeutics in Eindhoven and San Francisco, a drug discovery Biotech focusing on protein-protein interaction stabilization.

Based on groundbreaking scientific knowledge of protein interactions, his academic group and the company are developing a new class of drugs against cancer and other diseases. Through this activity, Brunsveld has shown himself to be a true supporter of valorization.

“The KNAW aims to be the forum, voice, and conscience of science in the Netherlands. It is an honor to now be a part of this more than 200 year old institution to help shape the future of science within the Netherlands,” says Brunsveld, who is based in the department of Biomedical Engineering at TU/e.

Marc Geers

Marc Geers (1964) studies the mechanics of diverse materials such as metals, composites, ceramics, paper, and metamaterials. His group investigates the relationship between structure and properties at a fundamental theoretical level, using advanced numerical methods to better understand mechanics, damage and fracture. Throughout his work, new measurement and test methods to characterize materials have also been developed in his group.

The social relevance of his work is underlined by the fact that it is almost completely rooted in industrial problems, while it is of the highest scientific level.

To train the next generations of materials engineers, Geers took the initiative to setup the Multi-Scale lab about 20 years ago, which is currently one of TU/e’s interdisciplinary labs. At the lab, students can learn to test, measure, experiment, and model on force scales ranging from kilonewtons to nanonewtons using state-of-the-art equipment.

“It is a great honor and recognition to be elected as a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, which is the highest quality-based authority in academics in The Netherlands,” says Geers, who is based in the department of Mechanical Engineering at TU/e.

Interestingly, Geers also recently completed the Midwest Mechanics Seminar tour in the US, which is an invited tour and longstanding seminar series where researchers are invited to present their research at ten universities in the US. The first tour took place in 1958.

The selection of Brunsveld and Geers as members of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences adds to the ever-growing list of TU/e researchers who are members of the Academy. With the addition of Brunsveld and Geers, TU/e will have 16 members in the Academy.

About KNAW

The KNAW was established in 1808 as an advisory body to the government, a task that it still performs today. The independent society is "the forum, the voice and the conscience of science in the Netherlands". In addition to Brunsveld and Geers, 20 new members, including two international members, have been elected to the academy. This brings the number of KNAW members to approximately 600, all of whom are leading scientists from all disciplines. Membership in the academy is for life.