Which immune mechanisms are involved in host defense against Staphylococcal infection?

An integrated approach for the simultaneous prediction of polypharmacology and binding affinity/potency of small molecules.

Conference

Leiden University seeks to bring knowledge, academic top talents, and resources from Leiden and China together in mutually beneficial joint research projects that are content-driven, based on existing excellent research.

Supervisor: Gerard van Westen

In dermatology, there should be a high level of multidisciplinary collaboration among institutes and specialists, Professor of Translational Dermatology, Robert Rissmann, will say in his inaugural lecture on 8 July. He is building an infrastructure that will put pre-clinical and clinical skin research…

In April, the X-omics initiative was granted 17 million euros from the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research. The subsidy is part of the National Roadmap for large-scale scientific infrastructure, intended to build or renew large-scale research facilities. What new insights will this investment…

Glucocorticoids (GCs) are widely prescribed as anti-inflammatory drugs due to their well-established immunosuppressive effects.

Fighting against cancer, antibiotic resistance and disposable plastics: Ahmed Ali, Fredj Ben Bdira, and Valerio Barbarossa receive a LUF grant for their innovative and socially relevant research. These grants for academic talent are often an important step towards grants by NWO and other grant insti…

With cancer, the immune system is a double-edged sword: it can attack tumour cells, but can also help them grow and spread. It is a question of harnessing it. This is what Professor Karin de Visser argued in her inaugural lecture on 15 November 2019.

An essential protein that regulates our heart beat turns out to be important for cancer cells as well. The discovery might open novel treatment strategies for fighting metastasis. Publication in Science Signaling on April 4th.

An overview of awards and prizes granted to our staff and students in 2018, as well as special appointments and royal distinctions.

In this work, we attempt to answer the question:

Using artificial intelligence to find new antibiotics. With that, researchers from Leiden University are nominated by magazine KIJK for the Best Tech-idea of 2021. From September 14 onwards people can vote to crown one of the nominees as the winner.

The work in this thesis describes the fundamental role of Lkb1 as a conductor of metabolism-related processes in zebrafish larvae.

A full overview of MCBIM PhD theses.

The receptor nomenclature committee of IUPHAR, the International Union of Pharmacology, has several subgroups. Among these are a few that our division is involved in, those for adenosine, nicotinic acid, and GnRH receptors.

Alexander Kros studies supramolecular systems in a biological environment. The unifying theme between the projects in my lab is specific molecular recognition, i.e. the intermolecular interaction between complementary molecules with high affinity and selectivity. Studying, imitating and dissecting processes…

The recognition that there may be more, so-called allosteric binding sites on a given receptor has also fueled our synthetic efforts. Over the last few years we have focused on many drug targets (adenosine A1, A2A and A3 receptors, the mGlu2 receptor and a classic ‘anti-target’, the hERG channel) to…

In the Phenomix Medical Delta Field Lab, which was officially opened on Thursday 9 July, scientists, healthcare institutions and businesses work together to develop innovative applications in the field of metabolomics. This research field makes it possible to determine which drugs will be effective…

PhD defence

In this thesis, a system pharmacology approach, integrating metabolomics, pharmacology and chemical biology, was applied to understand and modulate the endocannabinoid system across different model systems (cells, zebrafish, mice and humans).

A new research line is the development of liquid biopsy fingerprints to predict early Alzheimer’s disease (AD) stage in human in readily accessible body fluids in human (in collaboration with: Dr. Geert-Jan Groeneveld, CHDR; Prof. Elga de Vries, Free University Medical Center; and others).

The company Azafaros was established in 2018 to translate innovative science from Leiden University and Amsterdam University Medical Center into novel disease-modifying treatment modalities for rare genetic metabolic disorders such as lysosomal storage diseases.

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…

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,…

Source: PLoS ONE, Volume 10, Issue 3 (2015)

The Cardiovascular Pharmacology research group headed by Ilze Bot aims to elucidate the mechanisms that underlie atherosclerotic plaque destabilization, which is the key process that leads to acute cardiovascular syndromes such as a myocardial infarction or stroke.

Cardiovascular diseases are among the most frequent causes of death in the world. The main underlying pathology of cardiovascular diseases is the development of atherosclerosis in the medium and large-sized arteries.

With a €1.5 million European grant, industrial ecologist Stefano Cucurachi will work on more sustainable production methods for the pharmaceutical industry. The Italian company Angelini Pharma intends to use the resulting knowledge to make its production process more sustainable.

PhD defence

PhD defence

PhD defence

Brand-new professor Gerard van Westen works at the intersection of artificial intelligence and drug development. For the new chair in Artificial Intelligence and Medicinal Chemistry, he uses computer models to make drug development more efficient. Our ultimate goal is a virtual human which allows you…

PhD defence

PhD research recently completed by pharmacologist Margreke Brill shows that morbidly obese patients should be given a different dosage of the drugs Cefazolin and Midazolam. This could also apply to other drugs such as anti-cancer drugs as well as antibiotics and Margreke Brill is advocating a change…

Within the Chinese medicine, more than 80% of the constituents of the preparations are derived from plants. Like any other organism, plants are constantly interacting with their changing and often harsh environment during the various phases of their life cycle.

An international team of researchers led by Alice Booth (Leiden University, the Netherlands) have discovered methanol in the warm part of a planet-forming disk. The methanol cannot have been produced there and must have originated in the cold gas clouds from which the star and the disk formed. Thus,…

Lecture

On May 3rd, we had a successful LACDR Spring symposium. Traditionally the Spring symposium is an important platform for our PhD’s. We have highlighting the research activities of our PhD candidates. As Keynote speaker, Prof. dr. Matthias Mayer of the University of Heidelberg has given an interesting…

Is it possible for sugar patterns on cells to activate the immune system to combat cancer?

PhD student Janine Westendorp and her colleagues conducted literature research on what patients with cancer and their loved ones perceive as harmful communication from healthcare providers. The results were published in the journal Psycho-Oncology and are released as a poster to distribute to healthcare…

Source: J Cheminform, Volume 7, Issue 1 (2015)

During the Leiden Science Family Day, you can take part in various workshops. You can also watch various demonstrations. Where will you go?

Bones contain information about people’s lives such as where they came from, their age at death and which diseases they suffered from. Researchers can deduce a lot from them about a person’s life and about human evolution. This generates leads that could help solve present-day problems, such as how…

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

The ability to create objects and structures with our hands has been essential to human development. This ability is something modern society is at risk of losing. Leiden archaeologists gather knowledge about ancient processes of ‘making and creating’ over the centuries, knowledge that helps our current…