Dik van Gent,
Associate Professor,
Erasmus Medical Center
Dik van Gent studied biology in Utrecht and did his PhD research at the Netherlands Cancer Institute (Amsterdam) under the supervision of Prof. R.H.A. Plasterk. He investigated various aspect of the HIV DNA integration reaction. After receiving his PhD in 1993, he did three years of post doc research at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda (USA) under the supervision of Dr. M. Gellert.
During most of this time he was supported by an EMBO long term fellowship. He unraveled the basic mechanism of RAG1/2 mediated V(D)J recombination, which generates the antigen receptor diversity in B and T cells. For this work he received the biennial prize of the Netherlands Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (NVBMB) in 1997. In 1996 he moved to the Erasmus University Rotterdam (now Erasmus MC), Department of Molecular Genetics. He received a KNAW fellowship to establish his own line of research here. Since then he received research funding from the Netherlands Scientific Organization (NWO), the Netherlands Cancer Foundation (KWF), the Association for International Cancer Research (AICR) and the European Union.
He studied many aspects of DNA double strand break repair, with emphasis on the non-homologous end-joining pathway. More recently, he concentrated on studying the effects of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and targeted therapy in various types of cancer tissues using ex vivo culture methods. He authored approximately 100 peer-reviewed papers.
Cancer-on-Chip Assay for Chemotherapy Sensitivity of Breast Cancer Tissue
Monday, 24 June 2024 at 16:30
Add to Calendar ▼2024-06-24 16:30:002024-06-24 17:30:00Europe/LondonCancer-on-Chip Assay for Chemotherapy Sensitivity of Breast Cancer TissueOrganoids and Spheroids Europe 2024 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
Breast Cancer (BrC) response to chemotherapy is variable and biomarkers are not sufficient to correctly anticipate therapy response. Therefore, we aimed to develop an ex vivo assay to predict chemotherapy response in BrC patients, using a novel microfluidic platform. Patient-Derived Xenograft (PDX) tumors with known in vivo chemotherapy sensitivity or surgical BC samples were sliced and cultured in 6-wells plates (referred to as ex vivo culture), or in a Cancer-on-Chip (CoC) platform (BI/OND). Tissue slices were treated with the chemotherapeutic (e.g. cisplatin or paclitaxel) under both culture conditions. Tissue slices were Formalin-Fixed Paraffin-Embedded (FFPE) and 4 µm tissue sections were immunostained for proliferation, mitosis and/or apoptosis. Alternatively, a whole-mount immunostaining was performed to compare the 3D architecture of a fixed tissue slice with and without treatment. To observe cells over time a time-lapse experiment was done using Hoechst staining. The experimental setup allows assessment of the sensitivity of the PDX tumors by determining cellular proliferation, apoptosis and/or the ratio between mitotic and S-phase cells, depending on the chemotherapeutic used. The chemotherapeutics treatments yielded a better dose-response curve under the CoC culture conditions than the ex vivo method. Furthermore, CoC culture allowed longer incubation times without loss of viability (more than 14 days compared to 7 days).
Add to Calendar ▼2024-06-24 00:00:002024-06-25 00:00:00Europe/LondonOrganoids and Spheroids Europe 2024Organoids and Spheroids Europe 2024 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
Add to Calendar ▼2024-06-24 16:30:002024-06-24 17:30:00Europe/LondonCancer-on-Chip Assay for Chemotherapy Sensitivity of Breast Cancer TissueOrganoids and Spheroids Europe 2024 in Rotterdam, The NetherlandsRotterdam, The NetherlandsSELECTBIOenquiries@selectbiosciences.com
