Silver Medal Award for Maastricht researcher

Dr. Patrick Schrauwen, senior scientist on the WCFS project ‘Diet, insulin resistance and chronic inflammation’ and associate Professor at the Department of Human Biology of the Nutrition and Toxicology Research Institute Maastricht (NUTRIM), Maastricht University, has won the ‘Silver Medal Award’ of the ‘Nutrition Society’. Schrauwen will receive the award in Aberdeen (UK) on July 5th during the ‘Summer meeting: interactions between genetics, diet, health and disease’ of the Nutrition Society.

The prestigious Silver Medal has been awarded annually since 1991 to researchers below 40 years for scientific achievements in the field of nutrition.

Dr Schrauwen and his research group focus on research into the etiology of diabetes mellitus type 2, and especially on the role of disturbed fat metabolism. Research has shown that accumulation of fat in tissues such as muscle, liver and heart cause these tissues to become less sensitive to insulin, the hormone involved in the regulation of the blood sugar level. Schrauwen’s research focuses on life-style factors that lead to accumulation of fat in the muscle (through nutrition and physical inactivity) and tries to unravel through which molecular mechanisms muscular fat accumulation lead to insulin resistance.

Source: Wageningen Centre for Food Sciences, 27 June 2006