The field of environmental sciences has drastically changed over the past decades. A nature-society dichotomy in human-environment studies is increasingly giving way to interdisciplinary systems thinking, acknowledging the limitations of simplistic unidirectional relationships and accounting for interwoven interactions that change through space and time.  In recent years, environmental sciences have also become more inclusive, in the form of crowdsourcing and citizen science. Citizen science is starting to develop as a discipline on its own, aiming to do science in and with society.
Over the past years, I have developed an expertise in environmental risk assessment: the research I conduct on environmental risks is characterized by a transdisciplinary research design, integrating geo-spatial modelling with novel data sources, including very high resolution remote sensing and citizen science. 

Currently, I coordinate the SISTEM-NL project - a Dutch nationwide citizen science project in which we investigate the mechanisms behind microplastic emmissions from textiles in laundry, whereby we also investigate the potential of citizen science to alter attitudes, norms and ultimately behaviours driving these emissions: 

Other research topics in which I combine crowdsourced/citizen science data with geospatial information to better understand environmental risk include natural hazards, vector borne disease and land cover mapping: 

Some highlights are below:

Citizen Science (CS) - the practice where members of the general public conduct or participate in scientific research - is increasingly recognized for its contributions to scientific advancements, addressing wicked problems, monitoring Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and influencing policy. These expectations stem from two perspectives: the Productivity view, emphasizing CS’s benefits for scientific practice (e.g., mobilizing resources, scaling data collection), and the Democratization view, highlighting its potential to bridge the science-society gap and benefit communities. Integrating these perspectives is key to tackling complex sustainability challenges.

However, this integration presents potential tradeoffs in research design. Yet, research on best practices remains rare, making it difficult to systematically advance the science of citizen science. For example, within the Productivity view critiques on data quality persist, while the Democratization view is challenged by the exclusive nature of some CS initiatives, limiting accessibility and inclusivity. Despite these challenges, limited literature addresses CS tradeoffs or its interdisciplinary methodological complexities. Many still perceive CS as supplementary rather than integral to scientific inquiry and societal change. However, CS holds substantial scientific and societal potential, requiring targeted research efforts that enhance methodological rigor, inclusivity, and impact measurement to fully realize its promise.

In my research I take on an interdisciplinary perspective on citizen science, to further develop the practice and leverage its potential for sustainability transitions. In that capacity I'm WP-lead in the eXtreme Citizen Science Hub Amsterdam, and contribute as associate editor to the journal Citizen Science: Theory and practice. 

Some research lines and highlights include: