My name is Rene Bults, and I am a data steward within the Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Groningen, the Netherlands. I am part of the team of bio-informatics teachers.

I finished my bachelor in bioinformatics in 2019, within the same institute as where I work now. After my bachelor, I started working for the Nederlandse Aardolie Maatschappij (NAM) in Groningen, where I was a support engineer for employees in the gas fields as a trainee, but most of my relevant experience comes from my work within the UMCG in the department of pulmonary diseases, where I was a bio-informatician for more than two years.

During my work as a bio-informatician, I researched asthma, COPD and lung cancer using transcriptomic analyses and other types of analyses to shed light on possible mechanisms underlying these diseases. I have collaborated with researchers from many countries in a multi-national team, where we worked together to answer specific questions.

I am now working as a data steward, where I help research by managing data in a proper and tidy way, making use of the FAIR-principles. It is important to stress the positive effects of proper data management which can help speed up and maintain research projects and future projects.

My role in the Cure-Q consortium is data stewardship. Within WP5, I will manage all the different types of data that we will receive from the multiple university hospitals in The Netherlands. I will do this by facilitating storage and creating a system where we can visualize and download the data. This work is done together with Marcel Kempenaar and under supervision of Tsjerk Wassenaar.