Knowledge transfer
We continuously train our master students an PhD students in the topics ongoing within the ERC program, we have weekly meetings with the research team, where people present their work. Moreover, PhD students present findings at the meetings of the Doctoral School of the research institute (ONWAR), the departmental meeting and also at national meetings (GliaNed, BBBNedwork). Researchers within my team are frequently selected to orally present their work, selected from submitted abstract at relevant conferences (ESNI).
A number of the findings highlighted in the summary are currently published or submitted for publication. Based on the ERC program, I have been invited to various conferences to present our findings, such as the Gordon Research Conference Barriers of the CNS in 2024 as Keynote, the European Brain Barrier Meeting in Bern (2025) and the B4 Barcelona meeting (2025).
For the lay audience, I was invited to contribute to a major article in highly esteemed national newspaper NRC on the work ongoing in the ERC program. I also was interviewed for another national newspaper (De Volkskrant) again on the findings of this program. In January 2026, I will organize a science café in my home town to inform people on the role of the immune system in dementia in laymen style. This is next to the continuous dissemination of our findings to the general public via our website, the Alzheimer Center Amsterdam and the research institute Amsterdam Neuroscience.
Publications:
1. Hansen CE, Vacondio D, van der Molen L, Jüttner AA, Fung WK, Karsten M, van Het Hof B, Fontijn RD, Kooij G, Witte ME, Roks AJM, de Vries HE, Mulder I, de Wit NM. Endothelial-Ercc1 DNA repair deficiency provokes blood-brain barrier dysfunction. Cell Death Dis. 2025 Jan 3;16(1):1. doi: 10.1038/s41419-024-07306-0. PMID: 39753531; PMCID: PMC11698980.
2. van Olst L, Kamermans A, Halters S, van der Pol SMA, Rodriguez E, Verberk IMW, Verberk SGS, Wessels DWR, Rodriguez-Mogeda C, Verhoeff J, Wouters D, Van den Bossche J, Garcia-Vallejo JJ, Lemstra AW, Witte ME, van der Flier WM, Teunissen CE, de Vries HE. Adaptive immune changes associate with clinical progression of Alzheimer's disease. Mol Neurodegener. 2024 Apr 24;19(1):38. doi: 10.1186/s13024-024-00726-8. PMID: 38658964; PMCID: PMC11044380.
3. Hansen CE, Konings J, Toth G, Chornyi S, Karsten M, van Het Hof B, van der Pol SMA, Beekhuis-Hoekstra SD, Kok N, Fung WK, Dijksman NS, Baron W, Witte ME, Lanekoff I, de Vries HE, Kooij G. Spatial mapping of the AA-PGE2-EP axis in multiple sclerosis lesions. Acta Neuropathol. 2025 Apr 29;149(1):39. doi: 10.1007/s00401-025-02878-3. PMID: 40299057; PMCID: PMC12041062.
Dissemination
Media reports: I was invited to contribute to a major article in highly esteemed national newspaper NRC on the work ongoing in the ERC program. I also was interviewed for another national newspaper (De Volkskrant) again on the findings of this program.
Invited lectures: invited lectures increased (Gordon conference 2024; Keynote speaker, invited speaker at various conferences; PhD and postdocs from the group are more frequently invited from submitted abstracts)
A number of the findings in the summary above were unexpected, in which the findings that ApoE4 has such a large role in regulating the immune system is most unexpected and novel. In the recent year, I have focused more and more on the combination of studying progressive MS and the inflammatory processes and define either overlapping or distinct pathologies. In this way, we now investigate for instance demyelination in AD, based on technologies we developed for MS. Likewise, the studies on the immune cell trafficking come from MS related findings. In this way, we are advancing the research field by providing new leads for potential treatments.
