Saskia van Mil (PhD) is Professor of Molecular and Translational Metabolism at the University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands. She received her PhD from the University of Utrecht in 2004, on the topic of genetic disorders of pediatric cholestasis. As a post-doc at Imperial College London, United Kingdom, she studied the role of the bile salt sensor farnesoid X receptor (FXR) in intrahepatic cholestasis of pregnancy.
Since then, she has been intrigued by the versatility in molecular mechanisms of transcription by the nuclear receptor FXR and its therapeutic potential. Having received funding from the Netherlands’ Organisation of Scientific Research, European Commission, Dutch Digestive Foundation and DSM, her group studies the molecular and translational aspects of energy metabolism in the liver and the intestine, with a specific focus on the role of FXR in metabolic disorders (e.g. NASH) and disorders of intestinal integrity (e.g. IBD) and optimising the efficacy of FXR agonist treatment. In partnerships with clinical and industrial collaborators, her group aims to translate these research findings to improve patient care.