New group leader Wout Oosterheert: the devil is in the details

30-09-2025

To fully understand how a cancer cell grows and moves, you need to zoom in on the tiniest detail, new junior group leader Wout Oosterheert knows. Starting October 1, this protein specialist will give a boost to fundamental cancer research at the Netherlands Cancer Institute. He hopes to use state-of-the-art techniques to slice patient cells into thin sections and scan them as if in a CT scan. “It will be like a candy store for scientists.”

Why zoom in so closely on cells?
“The devil is in the details. Why can a single mistake in your DNA cause cancer or a severe degenerative disease? You need to grasp that if you want to properly understand and treat these conditions. Just knowing the DNA error itself is not enough.”

You focus on the proteins. Why are they so important?
“Proteins do all the work inside our cells, while DNA is just the blueprint required to make them. There’s still so much to discover about proteins. Thousands at once are active inside a cell, often working together or even physically bound to one another, and all of that is constantly changing. Studying proteins is next level.”

Technology has come a long way. What are some of the biggest advances?
“Twenty years ago, it would take years to determine the structure of just one protein. The process is much faster nowadays, and we can examine enormous protein complexes in different states. Microscopes have also been revolutionized; they can now reveal things that were previously invisible. And computers can even predict protein structures nowadays.”

Will AI take over your work?
“No. AI helps a lot, but it still makes plenty of mistakes, so experiments remain essential: both to train and improve algorithms, and to uncover how things work exactly.”

What are you looking forward to?
“I’d love to use a new technique called cryoET to view cancer cells from patients in 3D. Whole cells are too thick to study like that, but you can freeze them, slice them into thin layers, and then examine them under a special microscope. As the technique continues to develop, it really will be a candy store for scientists.”

Will you be able to control yourself in that candy store?
“It’s amazing to be the very first person to understand something at such a miniscule scale. My work can really feel like a hobby, although that’s not always the case. My brain works overtime now and then, so I do need to switch off completely sometimes. That’s when I exercise, to keep my mind healthy. I’m also a bit of a fantasy nerd, so I like reading very long books with more than a thousand pages. They pull me into another world and are complex enough to demand full attention. A great distraction from science, haha!”

Why did you decide to come to the Netherlands Cancer Institute?
“The NKI is known as one of the very best in my field. And it immediately felt right when I came here to interview. And when something feels right, I take my chance. That’s how I’ve always done things. I want to keep that attitude as I build my research group. Experienced analyst Jeffrey Klarenbeek will be joining my team, and I hope to recruit a PhD student soon. I’ve moved to Amsterdam now too, just a 10-minute walk from the institute, together with my girlfriend.”

You’ve also done research in Germany. What did you take from that experience?
“Germany has more hills than the Netherlands, so I brought back stronger calves, haha! But more seriously: scientifically I learned that once you discover something interesting, you need to keep going, full speed ahead. I also learned to identify which results are the most relevant. That’s increasingly important because science is moving fast, becoming more complex, and producing an endless stream of results.”

What drives you to dig so deeply?
“My curiosity motivates me. I love to figure out how things work down to the atomic level, and I’m good at it. I’ve done a lot of work on actin, one of the most common proteins in our cells. If you have a lot of muscle mass, you carry kilos of it. Actin gives cells their shape and allows them to move by ‘pushing’ against the cell membrane.”

How does this help us understand and combat cancer?
“The processes I study are often directly relevant to cancer. Cancer cells and immune cells, for instance, move around a lot in the body. What triggers that movement at the atomic level? This kind of knowledge can eventually lead to new cancer therapies. I’m excited to bring my expertise to the Netherlands Cancer Institute, and I look forward to all the collaboration with colleagues inside and outside the institute. I really feel like the right person in the right place.”

The Netherlands Cancer Institute was able to hire Wout Oosterheert thanks to donations to the AVL Foundation. Would you also like to contribute to cancer research? You can donate here.