Sander van Kasteren originally hails from the Netherlands. Before starting his degree he decided to come to Scotland for a year to study chemistry in the lovely city of Edinburgh, Scotland. Here he not only fell in love with the poetic beauty of Scotland, but also with the subject of chemistry itself; the 'year out' extending into a full MChem-degree.

Having flirted briefly with industrial chemistry, working for the likes of BP (on oil pipeline wax inhibitors) and Avecia (on surfactant additives for paints), he decided to move towards more biological applications of his chemistry.

Whilst working for a small spinout company (the unfortunately named YaBa) on the development of peptide-vaccines, he learned about the importance of carbohydrates in biological systems, their antigen-shielding properties in this case.

His current work is furthering his interest in the many roles carbohydrates play in biology and how their seemingly small interactions can make profound systemic differences in their hosts. This work has now taken stretched the original 'year out' to nearly a decade.

Last updated: 17-05-06