Prof. Dr. Sarah De Saeger is the Director of the Centre of Excellence in Mycotoxicology and Public Health and full professor in the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Ghent University, Belgium. Her research focusses particularly on the issue of mycotoxins at national and international level (including developing countries). In the last three years, 27 research projects were granted with funding from EU, FAO, EFSA, as well as national funding. Significant research expertise in mycotoxins and human health, detection methods, metabolomics (targeted and untargeted analysis), and mycotoxin occurrence has been amassed by the Prof de Saeger’s research group. The research covers the characterization (e.g. masked mycotoxins), exposure and screening through biomarkers as well as the development of innovative detection methods such as ‘molecularly imprinted polymers’ and biosensors next, chromatographic and immuno-based techniques.
Prof de Saeger has published more than 170 A1 peer-reviewed papers (h-index: 30) and is coordinating the MYTOX platform of which MYTOX-SOUTH aims to harness the expertise and infrastructure available at Ghent University to strengthen the capacity of the Southern partners to tackle the mycotoxin problem and the associated food safety and food security issues. In 2015, she established the Joint Laboratory of Mycotoxin Research of the Ghent University-Shanghai Jiao Tong University-Chinese Academy of Sciences (Shanghai Institutes of Biological Sciences).