PhD Towards tiered risk assessment strategy to evaluate safety of herbal supplements

Would you like to help detect health risks in herbal food supplements earlier, using data-driven approaches? Herbal supplements are often considered safe because they are natural. But how well do we actually understand their potential health effects? In this PhD project, you will develop a testing strategy to identify possible hazards earlier and contribute to safer use of herbal supplements.

PhD Candidate:
Towards a tiered risk assessment strategy to evaluate the safety of herbal supplements

Herbal food supplements are widely used and often perceived as inherently safe because they are ‘natural’. Yet these products can contain complex mixtures of bioactive compounds, and their composition may vary depending on the plant material, extraction method and production process. Contamination, adulteration and differences between batches add further uncertainty. Because these products are generally not tested before entering the market, potential adverse effects may only become apparent once they are already widely used.

That is why a robust and structured strategy is needed to better evaluate the safety of herbal supplements and reduce potential risks to human health. In this collaborative project, you will investigate the hepatotoxicity, nephrotoxicity, genotoxicity and endocrine‑disrupting potential of diverse herbal extracts using human‑relevant in vitro models and complementary bioassays. You will also examine how liver metabolism influences their toxicity.

For selected extracts, you will use chemical analyses such as LC‑MS/MS and GC‑MS to help identify the compounds responsible for the observed effects. The complementary PhD project at Utrecht University will investigate other potential adverse health effects, including neurotoxicity, cardiotoxicity and effects on the blood‑brain barrier.

This position is part of a four‑year research programme commissioned by the Netherlands Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority (NVWA). The project is a collaborative effort with Utrecht University to investigate and evaluate the potential toxicity of herbal supplements using a range of in vitro approaches. Together, the two projects will contribute to an integrated strategy for the early detection and prioritisation of potential hazards associated with herbal food supplements.

Your colleagues

You will work in the Department of Pharmacology & Toxicology at Maastricht University and be embedded in NUTRIM School of Nutrition and Translational Research in Metabolism. Here, you will join a multidisciplinary environment where biologists, chemists and toxicologists investigate how chemical exposures and oxidative stress alter cellular processes. The department gives you access to expertise and facilities in cell‑based toxicology, molecular biology and chemical analysis.

The project will be led at Maastricht University by Dr Misha Vrolijk, who will provide daily supervision.

What you do

• You develop and apply a next‑generation strategy for assessing the safety of complex herbal preparations. Your main activities are:
  Review scientific literature, nutrivigilance data, risk assessments and available in silico information to select relevant botanicals, endpoints and assays.
• Develop and validate an effect‑based test battery for hepatotoxicity, nephrotoxicity, genotoxicity and endocrine activity using well‑characterised reference botanicals.
• Use human‑relevant in vitro models and complementary bioassays to screen complete herbal preparations, including products whose exact composition is not fully known.
• Contribute to mechanistic experiments and targeted chemical analyses, including LC‑MS/MS and GC‑MS, to identify compounds associated with observed biological activity.
• Integrate toxicological, chemical‑analytical, in silico and nutrivigilance data to relate in vitro potency to plausible human exposure.
• Publish your findings in peer‑reviewed journals, present them at scientific meetings and contribute to project reporting.

Are you ready to set the course for the years ahead? Then we’d love to meet you.

What you bring
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