Dr. Frederic Béen is an Assistant Professor in the Chemistry for Environment & Health research group at the Amsterdam Institute for Environment and Health (A-LIFE) at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. His research bridges the fields of environmental analytical chemistry and data science, with a strong focus on developing advanced tools to detect and characterise contaminants that affect both human and environmental health.
Frederic’s work focuses on the use of high-resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS), combined with cheminformatics and machine learning, to trace the source, behaviour, and impact of a wide range of environmental contaminants. His work spans the full water cycle, from detecting pollutants in natural and engineered systems to studying their transformation during water treatment, and includes efforts to prioritise substances based on their potential hazard for humans and the environment. He is also actively developing computational strategies to enhance the identification and characterisation of chemicals detected through HRMS, often in combination with diverse chromatographic techniques and bioanalytical tools such as biotesting and effect-directed analysis (EDA). Frederic’s research also involves the advancement of micro- and nanoplastics (MNPs) analysis. By using pyrolysis coupled with gas chromatography and (high-resolution) mass spectrometry (Py-GC-(HR)MS), Frederic works on improving the accuracy and precision of human exposure assessment to MNPs in complex environmental and biological matrices.
