Acknowledgements 206 To all my fellow PhD candidate colleagues – both current and those who have moved on – Jeroen, Aleixandra, Amy, Hector, Steven, Amanda, Suwasin, Liang, Daphne, Hui, Shengbing, Yvette, Reshwan, and Quincy. Thank you so much for making this trajectory memorable: for celebrating the wins (publications), for drinking away the losses (rejections), for cheering each other on during presentations, and for exploring foreign cities during conferences. You are a great group of people – amazing entertainers and sharp scientists – and I wish you all the best in your current and future careers! To all the technicians at the Transplantation Lab: Wenda (Wennie), Rens (Reka), Mariska (Misa), Ronella (Ronnie), Sander (Såndør), Marjolein (Marjo), Annemiek (Miek), Frederique (Frey), and Derek (Pretletter). I gave each of you a nickname from the moment I arrived at the lab, and have since refused to use your given names outside formal meetings. Collectively, you taught me all the ‘wet lab’ skills I needed, showed me what it entails to run a biomarker study (the sheer amount of samples coming in daily was overwhelming at times), provided expert hands-on advice, and overall helped me perform my experiments. A special shout-out to Wennie (for joining the WWW-WV-EV-Team), Reka (for all flow cytometry discussions), and Pretletter (for making each interaction a delight). “Good friends don’t let their friends do stupid stuff alone” – Anonymous To Daan, Joey, Stefan, Jasper, Mark, Jesse and Frank (Jetse), you guys are more than just friends – I consider you all family. I tried to explain my work once by using M&Ms to illustrate the identification of different cellular particles, which – to this day – is all you guys have remembered (Daan: “Wel heel be-‘hap’-baar uitgelegd hoor”). Despite this lack of understanding, you guys have helped me through these last five years by smothering me with board games, D&D sessions, music (through listening, making, recording, and performing), whiskey evenings, and good long talks. You were, and continue to be, a welcome diversion to the mental exercise I have put myself through. Now that this is over, I am ready to have a life again ☺. “Dad, you are like a father to me” – Big Lebowski, 1998 A big thanks to my family and all those attached! Thank you all for the great family gatherings (always asking ‘when are you finished?’), and for providing reality checks whenever I would go on a rant about my exciting findings.
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