Hans Clever, Professor in Molecular Genetics at the University of Utrecht, Netherlands was named IBiS Distinguished Researcher, during the celebration of the V Edition of the UIMP-IBiS School of Biomedicine, giving the inaugural lecture on "Hepatobiliary organoids in the study of liver diseases".
Hans Clevers became famous for his research with stem cells in healthy and diseased intestines. The inner layer of the intestine, the epithelium, is renewed once every 4-5 days. At the same time, the intestinal stem cells produce new cells at a high rate. This enormous production of cells makes the intestine sensitive to the development of cancer. Clevers discovered in 1997 how a derailment of this normal cell production results in the formation of polyps, an early stage of cancer. From this, his research group identified the intestinal stem cell and developed methods to grow these stem cells in a laboratory into "mini-intestines" (organoids).
V UIMP-IBiS - Opening Lecture: Hepatobiliary organoids in the study of liver diseases.
Hans Clevers Hubrecht Institute - Utrecht - The Netherlands
December 2019
