Author Archives: hDMT

ZonMW Psider grant for Erasmus MC on a stem cell-based neuronal platform for treatment of neurodevelopmental disorders

ZonMw has awarded a PSIDER grant to a consortium led by Steven Kushner and Ype Elgersma from Erasmus MC. The grant is entitled ‘Towards a human iPSC neuronal platform for neurodevelopmental disorder therapeutic discovery’ and is a collaborative project between researchers from Erasmus MC, LUMC, Radboudumc and UMC Utrecht. Children with a genetic developmental disorder often require lifelong care, which has a major impact on the lives of patients, loved ones and society. In this project researchers will try to find a solution by repairing the genetic mutation using so-called ‘antisense oligonucleotides’. The goal is to develop a platform for identifying...

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Thesis Bas Lendemeijer (Erasmus MC): Leveraging human induced pluripotent stem cells for modeling brain diseases

Bas Lendemeijer obtained the doctor’s degree after the public defence of his thesis entiteld ‘Leveraging human induced pluripotent stem cells for modeling brain diseases’ at Erasmus MC on October 5th 2021. Induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-technology has created the ability to study the development of patient-derived neural cells in vitro and identify cellular phenotypes. The potential of this relatively new field has sparked great interest in the field of neuroscience and beyond. The work presented in this thesis attempts to improve the techniques to differentiate iPSCs towards cells of the neural lineage and demonstrates how these cells can be leveraged...

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An in vitro model of osteocytes remodeling activity in chronic kidney disease

Within the Open Competition Domain Science-XS a grant was awarded to Silvia Mihaila from Utrecht University for an in vitro model of osteocytes remodeling activity in chronic diseases. In the remodeling process, old bone breaks down and new bone gets built. Osteocytes, the major cells residing in bone, are the master regulators of bone remodeling. In certain diseases, such as chronic kidney disease (CKD), bone remodeling is disturbed resulting in weak and brittle bones. However, little is known on why and how osteocytes are affected by the disease. In this project we propose the development of an in vitro model...

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Next-generation Organ-on-a-Chip model for research and drug evaluation in fibrotic diseases- FibOoC

Researchers at UTwente and Radboudumc have received a grant for studying fibrotic disease within the Open Technology Programme (OTP) from NOW. The overall aim of the project, called FibOoC is to develop an in vitro human OoC model for fibrotic diseases built from crucial patient-derived cell types, and including essential elements known to drive the disease progression such as dense extracellular matrix, biomechanical cues, and hypoxia. As a case study, we will consider systemic sclerosis as a prototypical fibrotic disease. In this project, we will successively build a generic FibOoC model, generate and characterize patient-specific FibOoC models for systemic sclerosis...

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Mimicking the Biology of Engineered Protein and mRNA Nanoparticle Delivery Using a Versatile Microfluidic Platform

The teams of Prof Roland Brock and Wouter Verdurmen, PhD, Department of Biochemistry, Radboudumc, have recently implemented a versatile microfluidic platform that can be broadly employed to investigate drug delivery. Microfluidic systems are often designed specifically for certain applications. However, this is not always practical, especially in laboratories that are not specializing in the design of such systems. The researchers demonstrate that a single platform can be used both for specific targeting of carbonic anhydrase IX (CAIX) on tumor cells as well as serve as the basis for a bone-on-a-chip platform for the evaluation of mRNA delivery from colloidal biomaterials....

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Thesis Thijs Pasman (UTwente): Poly(trimethylene carbonate)-based membranes for biomimetic lung epithelial-endothelial models

On December 8th 2021 Thijs Pasman successfully defended his thesis ‘Poly(trimethylene carbonate)-based membranes for biomimetic lung epithelial-endothelial models’ at the University of Twente. The research was performed in the research group of Biomaterials, Science and Technology at the University of Twente under the supervision of Prof Grijpma, Prof Stamatialis and Dr Poot.         Dr Thijs Pasman Lung diseases are one of the most common causes of death. Moreover, there is a rise of lung-associated viruses such as SARS-CoV-2, which has caused the Covid-19 pandemic. Because of this, there is an unprecedented relevance of and need for lung...

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Funding for Body Barriers: a mucosa-blood-brain organ-on-chip platform

Sue Gibbs and Albert Feilzer, together with Elga de Vries and Vivi Heine (Amsterdam UMC) have been awarded with a TTW grant from NWO (850.000 Euro) to generate a multi-organ platform called Body Barriers. Here they will study if and how potentially neurotoxic substances from medical oral devices breach the neuroprotective blood-brain barrier to reach the brain and induce inflammatory and neurodegenerative effects, leading to cognitive decline. In this project, organ-on-chip technology will be used to create a vascularized multi-organ platform that will mimic the barriers between the mouth and the brain and will incorporate stem cell derived brain organoids....

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Turbo Grant for Growing Bone on Chip

Nico Sommerdijk (Radboudumc) and Pascal Jonkheijm (UTwente) have received a TURBO grant (80K) to develop an organoid-on-chip model to study patient-specific mechanisms of genetic bone disorders.                       Nico Sommerdijk (left) and Pascal Jonkheijm (right) Organ-on-chip and organoids (or ‘mini-organs’) are promising models for investigating physiological and pathological processes in tissue. In bone research, however, the development of these models is lagging behind. With this TURBO project, Pascal Jonkheijm (UT) and Nico Sommerdijk (Radboudumc) aim to change that. The aim is to examine the healthy bone formation, specifically the role of...

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Rapid Prototyping of Organ-on-Chip Devices Using Maskless Photolithography

Dhanesh Kasi and colleagues have developed a cleanroom-free microfabrication procedure for rapid prototyping of Organ-on-Chip and microfluidic devices. Organ-on-Chip (OoC) refers to biomimetic microdevices that contain cell culture compartments and/or microfluidic channels and (human) cells. They may also include integrated sensors for functional measurements, or valves to control fluid flows. Chips are usually produced in cleanroom facilities that contain specialized equipment for microfabrication. A fast and low-threshold method for fabricating simple OoC and microfluidic devices is beneficial to reduce prototyping times, and lowers barriers for labs to perform OoC research. A simplified and cleanroom-free microfabrication procedure by using a digital...

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Pim de Haan defends PhD thesis on gut-on-a-chip work

On Friday, November 19th, 2021 Pim de Haan successfully defended his PhD thesis titled ‘Microfluidic digestive systems for drug analysis’ at the University of Groningen. He conducted his PhD research in the Pharmaceutical Analysis group at the Groningen Research Institute of Pharmacy, with Prof. Sabeth Verpoorte as thesis advisor and dr. Klaus Mathwig as co-adviser. Dr Pim de Haan and Prof Sabeth Verpoorte. His research, which was funded by the Dutch Research Council (NWO), focused on the development of gut-on-a-chip devices for drug and toxicology testing. In collaboration with Wageningen University and a team of industrial partners, a modular system...

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