Leiden University and Leiden University Medical Center have joined the Netherlands Centre for One Health (NCOH), further strengthening the academic network in which such problems as antimicrobial resistance are studied.

Promotor: M. Ubbink, Co-promotor: G. Siegal

Key publications of the Predictive Pharmacology group.

Combining different disciplines, researchers work together to formulate innovative solutions to societal problems.

Key publications of the Quantitative Pharmacology group

A tantalizing concept that has emerged in our recent research is binding kinetics. An important parameter is residence time (RT), a direct reflection of how long a drug stays bound to its target. This parameter is of crucial importance, because drug action lasts only as long as the receptor-ligand complex…

The project 'Policing the high seas: maritime law-enforcement in a multi-actor environment' aims to identify the gaps in the legal framework for EU activities in the maritime security domain, and specifically in the areas of combating piracy, human smuggling or trafficking and drug trafficking.

Key publications of the Quantitative Clinical Pharmacology group

Treatment with special stem cells seems to be a good option for suppressing the immune system in organ transplants. Researchers are trying to learn from processes that take place in the human body during pregnancy.

How do pathogenic mycobacteria alter lipid metabolism in human cells and patients, and which disrupted pathways could be targeted for new antibiotics?

In this project, we aim to obtain a quantitative understanding of the role of the immune system in tumor regression, of the role of tumor cell heterogeneity in cancer growth and of tumor cell migration properties.

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

Supervisor: Maarten Doornbos

With an MSc degree in BPS and Science Communication & Society you are well prepared for a broad array of career prospects in research or industry. The master’s degree is an excellent preparation for a career at the interface of science and public affairs.

Following their application to system biological models, control theory techniques have further potential to aid in the understanding and application of quantitative systems pharmacology models.

The Delivery of Biotherapeutics research group is led by Prof. Matthias Barz and focusses on the synthesis and characterization of polypept(o)ids and their application in nanomedicine to improve existing therapies or enable novel diagnostic or therapeutic approaches.

Researchers at LED3 are working together with biopharmaceutical company Galapagos to develop software for use in early drug discovery (funded by NWO). This software is able to design molecules with several simultaneously optimized characteristics and will also take prediction reliability into consideration…

Pharmacy undergraduate education at Leiden Pharmacy combines the strong scientific foundation of the bachelor programme Bio-Pharmaceutical Sciences with experience-based learning and a strong focus on pharmaceutical patient care and pharmaceutical treatment in the master programme Pharmacy.

An overview of research themes and projects at ABS.

Urban riots, violent responses by police, drug-related assassinations, child abuse, bar fights: Violence is a core theme in today’s modern society.

PhD defence

With cancer, a person’s body cells grow uncontrollably. Putting together a detailed picture of how this comes about makes it possible to develop efficient therapies. Researchers at the Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC) and Leiden University are working together to gain a better understanding…

GRIPonMASH will address the unmet public health need of reducing disease burden and comorbidities associated with Metabolic dysfunction-Associated Steatotic Liver Disease (MASLD).

A major goal of ABS research is to overcome one of the major bottle-necks in metabolomic research: the lack of a high-throughput infrastructure in which thousands of samples can be processed in a standardized and cost-effective way (max. a few tens of Euro’s per sample for a full metabolome profile).…

Would you like to know more about our research using laboratory animals or our studies on alternatives to animal testing? If so, take a look at the news articles on the right-hand side of the page (for mobile users, see the bottom of the page).

The last decades it is increasingly recognized that acute as well as chronic postoperative pain is an important problem. Treatment and prevention of postoperative pain is a challenge, especially in special patient populations where there is only limited guidance on how to optimally use opioids.

There is an urgent need for more physiologically relevant cell culture methods to guide compound selection in pre-clinical stages of the drug development pipeline.

In the studies described in this study, we introduce a novel ex vivo human skin barrier repair model. To develop this, we removed the upper layer of the skin, the stratum corneum (SC) by a reproducible cyanoacrylate stripping technique.

The skin is our natural barrier and lipids are a key part of this barrier. In the outer skin layer, the stratum corneum (SC), lipids form a densely organized structure dependent on the composition of these lipids.

Promotor: Prof.dr. M.K. Richardson

Source: J Med Chem (2015)

In summary, the collective results described in this thesis show that nanoparticulate vaccines can be delivered intradermally by coated and hollow microneedles and evoke antigen-specific immune responses.

Childhood obesity is an increasing health issue. In the first part of this thesis comorbidities in children with obesity were studied, concerning the diagnostic process and dosing regimens.

An important feature of atopic eczema (AE) is a decreased skin barrier function. The stratum corneum (SC) lipids - comprised of ceramides (CERs), free fatty acids (FFAs) and cholesterol - fulfill a predominant role in the skin barrier function.

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.

Source: Org Biomol Chem, Volume 13, Issue 8, pp. 2407-22 (2015)

Viral hemorrhagic fever (VHF) is a group of acute diseases caused by highly infectious viruses including Ebola, Lassa, Dengue viruses. Its high mortality rate poses high risk to public health, however, studies on VHF have been hampered due to the non-availability of proper models and incomplete knowledge…

ChEMBL is a large-scale drug discovery database containing bioactivity information primarily extracted from scientific literature.

The lipids in the uppermost layer of the skin, the stratum corneum (SC), play an important role in the skin barrier function. The three main SC lipid classes are ceramides (CER), cholesterol and free fatty acids.

Source: Structure , Volume 22, Issue 8, pp. 1120-1139 (2014)

To increase clinical success rate of drugs, a better understanding of drug action mechanism and disease dynamics is required. Metabolomics, which studies small molecules involved in biochemical processes in organisms, has shown to be a useful tool for this better understanding.

Netherton Syndrome (NTS) is a rare genetic skin disease caused by mutations in the serine protease inhibitor Kazal-type 5 gene, which encodes the lympho-epithelial Kazal-type-related inhibitor. NTS patients have a profound impaired skin barrier function. Because SC lipids play a crucial role in the…

Both psoriasis and atheroslcerosis are diseases characterized by a chronic and systemic inflammatory profile with local lipid disturbances that alter the barrier function of the skin (psoriasis) and cause the development of atherosclerotic plaques (atherosclerosis).

Microneedles represent promising tools for delivery of drugs to the skin. However, before these microneedles can be used in clinical practice, it is essential to understand the process of skin penetration by these microneedles.

Promotores: Prof.dr. E.A.L. Biessen, Prof.dr. T.J.C. van Berkel

Promotor: Prof.dr. J. Kuiper, Co-Promotor: S.C.A. de Jager

Promotors: C.A.J. Knibbe, Anthonius de Boer, Co-promotor: M.M.J. van der Vorst

Promotor: J.A. Bouwstra Co-promotor: A. El Ghalbzouri

The objective of this study was to investigate the expression and function of GRHL2 in different breast cancer subtypes.