Author Archives: hDMT

Veni grant for Kirsten Pondman

Kirsten Pondman (UTwente, group Séverine LeGac) was awarded a Veni from NWO-TTW for her project: Circulating tumor cells: together we triumph, divided we fall Cancer cells can travel through the body as clusters, with for example immune cells and/or platelets. These clusters (CTMs) may be better equipped to survive in the blood flow and cause cancer spreading (metastasis) compared to individual cancer cells (CTCs). Yet, their extreme rarity makes their study very challenging. Here, CTM models will be created, with well-defined compositions, to identify which of their characteristics increase their survival and ability to cause metastasis, using a blood vessel model....

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ILTS Young Investigator Award for Shaojun Shi

Shaojun Shi from Department of Surgery, Erasmus University Medical Center, the Netherlands won a ILTS Young Investigator Award from the International Liver Transplantation Society for his research entitled “ Modeling ischemic cholangiopathy in human cholangiocyte organoids for screening of novel cholangio-protective agents”

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Research grant on Parkinson disease for Amalia Dolga

Prof. Amalia Dolga (GRIP, University of Groningen) was awarded a research grant from Stichting Parkinson Fonds, of 250,000 Euros. This research will be performed by a talented Postdoctoral fellow, Angelica Sabogal Guaqueta, in collaboration with co-PI’s Prof. Arjan Kortholt (GBB, University of Groningen) and Prof. Sabeth Verpoorte (GRIP, University of Groningen). In this project, they will investigate how miscommunication between neurons and microglia affect the pathology of Parkinson’s disease. The team combines the expertise of the Dolga lab (iPSC differentiation into brain cells, including neurons and microglia, mitochondrial and LRRK2 biology), the Kortholt lab (LRRK2 biochemistry, tools and structure) and...

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Hat-trick for the kidney team of Roos Masereeuw

Anne Metje van Genderen and Marta G. Valverde, PhD candidates from Experimental Pharmacology group at UU have some exciting news to share with hDMT. The two young researchers have been working on a project titled “Co-axial Printing of Convoluted Proximal Tubule for Kidney Disease Modeling“ in which they are combining coaxial printing and on-a-chip approaches for mimicking the kidney proximal tubule. While preparing the manuscript, they put together a poster, which has been awarded “Best Poster” 3 times: at NBTE (Netherlands society for Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering, MDR (Materials Driven Regeneration) Annual Event and UIPS (Utrecht Institute for Pharmaceutical Sciences)...

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ERC Advanced Grant for Carlijn Bouten

Carlijn Bouten (TU/e) received an ERC Advanced Grant of 2.5 million euro grant along with an additional half a million euros for equipment for her project RE-ALIGN: restoring anisotropy in living tissues ‘in situ’. Living heart muscle The research focuses on repair in the living heart. The goal is to eventually be able to repair cardiac tissue exclusively using the self-organizing capacity of the tissue. “Once I have fully explored this capacity, I then aim to use ultrasound to encourage tissue to organize itself. Previous research has shown this to be possible, but those studies did not take place in...

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NWO-XS grant for Angelo Accardo

Angelo Accardo (TU Delft) received a NWO-XS grant (€ 50000) for the project: Unravelling neuronal growth cone mechanobiology via sub-micrometric fabrication and super-resolution microscopy Comparing the growth of healthy and diseased neurons is fundamental to understand and tackle neurodegenerative diseases (e.g. Alzheimer’s, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis). The growth cone (GC) is a mechanosensitive structure, which probes the surrounding environment and connects neurons. To date, the GC has mainly been studied by employing unrealistic 2D bulky “petri-dish” configurations unable to mimic the brain microenvironment. We will pioneer a reproducible 3D GC model by combining 3D printed sub-micrometric biomaterials, able to simulate the...

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Daphne Panocha starts PhD project on the development of immunocompetent human Lymph Node-on-Chip

PhD student Daphne Panocha joined the group of Prof.dr. Reina Mebius and Prof.dr. Sue Gibbs at the department of Molecular Cell Biology & Immunology, Amsterdam UMC in May 2022. Her research is focused on the development of a immunocompetent Human Lymph Node-on-Chip model with integrated lymphatics as a part of the LymphChip consortium.

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Farhad Sanaei starts research on Bone-on-Chip systems at RadboudUMC

Farhad Sanaei joined the group of Regenerative Biomaterials at the Department of Dentistry of Radboud University Medical Center as of 1 May 2022. Farhad has obtained a BSc degree in Mechanical Engineering from Urmia University of Technology (Iran) and a MSc degree in Biomedical Engineering from Polytechnic University of Milan (Italy). Farhad will carry out his PhD research under supervision of Dr. Mani Diba to develop bone-on-chip models which recapitulate the spatial heterogeneity of cells in bone by means of bioprinting. This project is part of the BoneChipPredict Hypatia Project of Radboud University Medical Center, which aims to combine bottom-up...

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Germaine Aalderink joins the LymphChip consortium

Germaine Aalderink joined the group of Hans Bouwmeester at Wageningen University as PhD student from May 1st 2022. During her PhD, she will develop an in vitro microfluidic model with intestinal and lymphatic endothelial cells as part of the LymphChip consortium. This model will be used to simulate nutrient and drug transport in the intestine.

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Your own cells as medicine!

  hDMT is represented at the ‘Publieksdag Leiden’ in the context of ‘Leiden, City of Science’ on 28 May 2022. This day has been organized by the Dutch Research agenda, route Regenerative Medicine. Universities and companies from the whole country will present the latest developments in the field of regenerative medicine. Researchers from different hDMT partners will inform the public about the role and importance of Organs-on-Chips in drug development, personalized medicine, and reduction of animal experiments. On the basis of four Organ-on-Chip models (gut, liver, vessels and heart) they will show how these are designed and fabricated, what is...

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