PhD Conferral Mrs. (Ankie) J.P. van Geffen, MSc.

 Keywords: flow chamber, platelets, coagulation, thrombus formation, kinetics

“Complex platelet phenotyping: integrative assessment of platelet activity in haemostasis and thrombosis”

For my dissertation, I researched the complex mechanisms underlying thrombosis. Using the flow chamber model (a perfusion model that simulates thrombosis formation in a blood vessel), I measured thrombus formation in flowing blood by examining various vessel wall components and markers for platelet activation and blood clotting over time (kinetics). In healthy people, individual differences in the parameters for thrombus formation were discovered that could be partially explained by variations in and among genes. By measuring the kinetics of thrombus and fibrin formation, a new stimulation mechanism of the intrinsic coagulation pathway through tissue factor was discovered. In the blood of mice with hyperlipidaemia, thrombus formation was significantly higher, caused in particular by elevated platelet cholesterol.