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PulmoScience Lab
Leiden

Our research

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ADVANCED
CELL CULTURE

  • ALI-PxEC

  • Organoids

  • Lung-Chips

  • hiPSC

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REPAIR &
REGENERATION

  • Epithelial Dysfunction

  • Epithelial - Immune cross-talk

  • Epithelial - Endothelial cross-talk

  • AATD

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HOST
DEFENCE

  • Host - Bacterial interactions

  • Host - Viral interactions

  • Antimicrobial Peptides

Our Cell Culture

Techniques

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Transwell cultures are the most used cell culture platform in our laboratory. We culture primary nasal, tracheal, bronchial and alveolar cells and culture these at the air-liquid interface.

In our research we use feeder-free primary nasal, bronchial, alveolar and tumor organoid cultures. We use our organoids mainly for expansion and propagation of epithelial cells and studies on development and repair.

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In our laboratory we use the commercial Organ-Chip platform from Emulate Inc. for Airway and Alveolar cultures to study the effects of breathing-like stresses on cell behavior  and have developed an in-house vascularized Alveolus Lung-Chip to study cellular cross-talk in lung injury.

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Human induced pluripotent stem cell (hiPSC)-derived alveolar and endothelial cells are used in our lab to study repair and disease pathogenesis.

OUR LAB

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PulmoScience Lab Leiden

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Respiratory Cell Biology and Immunology is a fascinating area of research. It is not only essential for our understanding of the pathogenesis of (chronic) lung diseases, but also for the prevention, and treatment of these diseases.

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Research by the team of Hiemstra is conducted in a clinical department where basic, translational and clinical science meet. Research is mainly focussed on obstructive lung diseases, but has more recently also developed into lung cancer and lung fibrosis research.

 

Epithelial cells that line the airway and the alveoli take center stage in their research. Understanding the function of these cells in health and disease is essential for understanding their role in chronic inflammation, repair of injured lung tissue, and lung cancer.

OUR HEAD

Prof. Pieter S. Hiemstra

Pieter S. Hiemstra is Professor of Respiratory Cell Biology and Immunology, and head of the PulmoScience laboratory Leiden of the Department of Pulmonology of the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC).

He was trained as a medical biologist at Utrecht University and obtained his PhD in Leiden. Besides his research activities that are largely focused on obstructive lung diseases, more recently he has also focused on lung cancer and lung fibrosis. His other activities include teaching and curriculum development for Biomedical Sciences and Medical students.

​He has organized a range of symposia and conferences, and is active in various national and international organizations. In 2015, he chaired the Annual Congress of the European Respiratory Society in Amsterdam. He is currently Section Editor Basic Science of the European Respiratory Journal. He has authored over 330 papers and book chapters.

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Pieter Hiemstra was been elected in 2014 as Fellow of the European Respiratory Society (ERS), the largest respiratory society worldwide.

“I am passionate about understanding lung diseases and development of innovative treatments with use of patient- and disease-relevant culture models.”

Contact Us

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