Who are you and where are you from?
"I am Seino Jongkees. A simple question, you might think, but where I come from is always a bit tricky to explain briefly. My parents are Dutch, but I was born in New Zealand, so that also feels like an important part of my background. I got my PhD in Canada, and then I did a post-doc in Japan. Later I came back to the Netherlands, although "back" doesn't feel quite right, because I didn't really grow up here. My Dutch background sometimes feels a bit distant, as if I had to re-learn it when I ended up back in the Netherlands. I ended up living in Utrecht, and so although I am a bit in between two worlds, in many ways I am just a Dutchman with an international background."
What was it like growing up in New Zealand?
"In itself, it was very nice. New Zealand is a beautiful country - literally stunning nature, mountains, forests, beaches - it's great for a holiday. But that's kind of it: I saw it more as a nice place to be occasionally, not as something I wanted to stay in permanently. I'm someone who likes what a city offers, the possibilities and convenience of it. In New Zealand, everything was pretty far away, literally and figuratively. So while I can appreciate it there, I feel more at home in the Netherlands. Getting out into nature every now and then is nice, but I'm not someone who needs to be outside every day. So in the end, I just feel comfortable here, in an urban environment."
How did you get interested in chemistry?
"Science always attracted me in secondary school, but chemistry as a subject? I didn't have anything to do with that at first. That was mainly because of how it was taught: lots of memorisation, memorising endless lists - like which salts have which colour - I found that terribly boring. I was actually more interested in biology at the time. But the teacher matters a lot too, doesn't it? I also liked physics.
I started studying microbiology, then it became biochemistry, and eventually I moved more and more towards chemistry. At university, I only really got an idea of what "real" chemistry is, and I suddenly found it fascinating. Especially when I saw that you could also combine it with my interest in biology. It's funny: that combination of chemistry and biochemistry seemed logical to me, but it turned out to be quite difficult to combine that within a study programme. I often had to request exceptions and adjust subjects. Still, I liked it enough to just persevere."
What is your field and why did you start doing this research?
"My field is at the intersection of organic chemistry, biochemistry and biotechnology. I mainly focus on systems to find new drugs - not necessarily making the drug itself, but rather developing methods to detect them faster and better.
Within that field, I find peptides as drugs particularly interesting. Peptides have properties of both small molecules and antibodies. As a result, they can sometimes penetrate deep into cells or actually enter into specific interactions with proteins - all of which opens up new possibilities. For a long time, peptides were seen as a bit 'tricky' in the pharmaceutical world, but that is changing, partly because we have better technologies to work with them.
I work with a system called mRNA display, where you build up a peptide biochemically and at the same time link a genetic code to it. So you can very easily find out which peptide binds well to a target protein. You can test millions of variants at once. My interest lies mainly in how we can improve this system and make it more efficient, so that the molecules found are closer to the final product. I find that fascinating."
What do you want to achieve with your research in the future?
"Well, of course I would have to say something pretty idealistic about that, like: "I want to find a drug that saves lives." But honestly. that's not necessarily where the essence lies for me. I mainly enjoy tinkering with those systems - making them better, more efficient, smarter. That's my drive.
In the long run, though, it would be cool if something I developed in my lab - for example, a variant of mRNA display - is taken over in a startup or spin-off. That my platform is then actually used to develop drugs. That seems like a great outcome. But my main goal is mainly to improve the process at the beginning of the development process, not necessarily the drug itself."
Do you work a lot with others?
"Yes, absolutely. My work is at the interface of different disciplines, so collaboration is essential. I myself work on the platform - so the chemical and biochemical side - but the applications almost always happen in collaboration with biologists or medical researchers. Often someone comes to me with a certain protein that is important for a clinical picture, and then together we see if we can use my method to find a peptide that binds to it.
That keeps the work varied and interesting. I keep learning about new biological systems, new diseases, and new ways in which proteins react.
At the same time, it also brings challenges - every time we start over with a new peptide, new synthesis steps, new optimisation. You can rarely build routines. But that keeps it sharp."
Tell something about yourself that people don't already know about you. Do you have any hobbies or other interests?
"Yes, I do fencing! That's really my big hobby. I used to do that pretty seriously. I even fenced against the world top - and unfortunately lost, but still! In New Zealand, the fencing world is small, so you quickly come out on top there.
Nowadays I do it a lot less fanatically. I now do it for fun, when I feel like it.
Oh, and I have two cats. I consider those a bit like my children."