The Centre for Biomedical Genetics (CBG) is a combination of 15 Dutch research groups in the Life Sciences, the largest combination in the Netherlands. These groups have been selected from four Research Schools with their roots in four universities, located in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Leiden and Utrecht. The group leaders were chosen based on the quality of their research and commitment to the theme, ignoring boundaries of their respective disciplines, biology, chemistry, and health sciences. Together, the groups combine a wide range of expertise required to carry out the research program, including Genetics, Molecular and Cell Biology, Biochemistry and Structural Biology. Seven research groups from the NKI take part in the CBG: the research groups of Reuven Agami, René Bernards, Anton Berns, Piet Borst, Wouter Moolenaar, Titia Sixma, and Maarten van Lohuizen.
The CBG aims to understand the function of genes and gene products in relation to disease employing a multidisciplinary approach. A large number of common diseases are caused by combinations of (mildly) dysfunctioning genes and the environment. A major challenge for the CBG is to translate this knowledge into an understanding of physiology and pathology, and eventually into therapeutics and disease prevention. Functional analysis of the genome requires genetics and genomics, molecular and cell biology, protein chemistry, proteomics and bio-informatics, a combination the CBG offers. Since the start of the CBG more than 40 collaborations have been established between the group members.
Centre for Biomedical Genetics (CBG)