Development & Disease is one of the four research themes of the Institute of Biology Leiden.

Animal Sciences’ contributions to the Development & Disease research theme include the mechanisms and evolution of embryonic development, the development of cognitive mechanisms, and animal models for understanding mechanisms of human disease.

Microbial Sciences'contribution to the Development & Disease research theme is to perform world-class research to understand cellular morphogenesis, growth, development and virulence of microbes.

Plant Sciences' contribution to the Development & Disease research theme is to unravel the processes that allow plants to adapt to changing abiotic and biotic environmental conditions or stresses, with the aim to contribute to the sustainable production of food, flowers and bio-based products using…

Can we build a biosensor to detect neuroblastoma markers in urine using the chemotaxis system in E. coli?

How does the endocannabinoid system in the zebrafish function at the molecular and phenotypic levels and how is it linked to the stress axis?

Unraveling the immune-suppressive actions of drugs like prednisone.

Visualization of biomolecules in living cells by tagging with gold nanoparticles.

A novel in vivo model system for studies on glucocorticoid resistance

Exploiting metabolic vulnerabilities to identify anticancer compounds in zebrafish synthetic lethality screens.

How is vegetative development regulated in plants and how does this affect a plant’s life history strategy?

A main goal of MSBB research is to address the major bottle-necks in combatting viral diseases: the lack of experimental models that are representative of human pathology and are cost effective and versatile. Viral diseases such as those that cause viral hemorrhagic syndromes or severe acute respiratory…

How can the development of constrictions in the blood vessels be reversed?

Can we bring novel treatment options to the clinic for UM patients with liver metastases?

A theoretical project on the insights gained by human (including infant), nonhuman animal and computational studies on artificial grammar learning; identifying the critical questions for future research by developing novel experimental and computational approaches to address these issues.

Do humans and zebra finches share cognitive mechanisms that are important for speech perception?

How does FoxP1 affect auditory perception on a behavioural and genomic level?

Can thrips resistance in strawberry be explained based on secondary metabolite profiles and plant morphological traits?

We aim to unravel the complex and intertwining regulatory systems that control development and antibiotic production in streptomycetes.

How can cell wall engineering approaches be used to improve streptomycetes for industry to make new antibiotics?

We aim to engineer streptomycetes to fully exploit their potential for natural product productions, by a rational design and evolution approach.

Studying the impact of urbanisation on the respiratory health of past Dutch populations (1200-1850 CE).

Female and male songbirds sing equally elaborate songs in some species, but in others, females do not sing like males or not at all. How did such pronounced differences in male and female communication evolve?

We aim to gain a better understanding of the natural disease progression of ALS in order to improve clinical trial design and analysis and to support drug discovery and clinical development of new drugs.

A central and much debated topic in the study of language acquisition concerns the nature of the learning mechanisms that are required. Are the computational and learning mechanisms that guide learning about language structure special and specific to language or humans?

Neurodegenerative diseases, including Parkinson’s disease (PD), are increasing in prevalence due to the aging population. Despite extensive study, these diseases are still not fully understood and the lack of personalised treatment options that can target the cause of the diseases, rather than the symptoms,…

Promotor: Prof.dr. H.P. Spaink, Co-promotor: Prof. dr. A.H. Meijer

The availability of complete plant genome sequences together with the ever increasing amount of data on the molecular, cellular and physiological mechanisms of plant development require mathematical and computational models to obtain a complete overview of and generate new insights into the quantitative…

How to identify patients at risk of developing devastating, metastatic disease and facilitate the development of personalised treatment for prostate cancer patients?

What is the role of auxin in the initiation and process of somatic embryogenesis?

Bone research provides plenty of detailed data about the health of a person or a group. This data is not only used to reconstruct the past but also to fight disease today.

Having a chronic somatic condition can result in a variety of impairments in patients’ daily lives, including not only physical complaints such as pain, itch, and fatigue, but also problems of negative mood and impairments in social relationships. Next to disease characteristics, individual difference…

Lysosomal storage disorders (LSDs) are a group of orphan diseases characterized by lysosomal dysfunction or impaired lysosomal catabolism and affect collectively about 1 in 5000 live births.

Cardiovascular disease is the number one cause of death worldwide. The most important risk factor for developing this disease is high cholesterol levels in the blood.

Lecture

We aim to develop a microfluidic platform that can parallelize testing the performance and characteristics of pure, mixed and environmental bacteriophage samples.

Soil is a home for an unbelievable diversity and abundance of microbial life that is essential for supporting life on our planet.

Inflammatory skin diseases such as psoriasis and atopic dermatitis can severely impact both the physical and social aspect of a patient’s life. Aberrant inflammatory responses are thought to be a major causative factor in these disorders, but an abundance of different factors contribute to the development…

The structure of bacterial cells provides crucial clues about their interaction with their host. What are the key structural features of a bacterial cell that determine pathogenicity? What roles do these structures play in the life cycle, and how do they change during the infection process?

Do large deletions represent a risk during CRISP/CAS9-mediated genome editing in plants?

LUMC researchers are looking for factors that point to illness at an early stage.

LUMC researchers are looking for factors that point to illness at an early stage.

Which plant leaf characteristics are involved in thrips resistance in tomato?

1. What is the exact role of PIN proteins in PAT? 2. How is PIN polarity established, and how is it modulated by AGC kinase-mediated phosphorylation? 3. What is the role of the AGC kinase, as modulators of PAT, in translating environmental signals, such as gravity, light or mechanical stress, to plant…

As a new vision on food production, the feasibility study on LED light to grow crops with the biological- and chemical evaluation of final products.

Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease are the most common neurodegenerative disorders. Unfortunately, no effective treatments are currently available to halt the progression of these neuroinflammatory diseases [1].

This thesis describes biochemical investigations of glucocerebrosidase (GBA), the lysosomal β- glucosidase that is deficient in Gaucher disease (GD).

Biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs) for natural products are widespread in microbial genomes, and they are rapidly exchanged. This research assesses the factors that control the spread of BGCs and resistance genes in nature. This includes risk assessment for the spread of engineered DNA in nature.

How can we develop new chemical biology tools and approaches to understand and interfere with glucosylceramide metabolism in relation to Gaucher disease?

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most frequent neurodegenerative disorder and the primary cause of dementia. The neuropathological features of AD include the occurrence of senile plaques, neurofibrillary tangles, decreased synaptic density, and loss of neurons. An obstacle in the study and treatment…