Michiel Van der Heijden

Group leader

Since starting my PhD at the Kern lab (Johns Hopkins University) in 2002, I have been interested in understanding the differential sensitivity to cancer treatment.

In 2005, I completed my PhD in pancreatic cancer genetics and started my internal medicine training. From 2009-2011, I joined the lab of Rene Bernards at the NKI as a postdoc, to study resistance to targeted therapy in breast and colon cancer. After completing my medical oncology fellowship in 2013, I started my own research group at the NKI and joined the medical oncology faculty as a clinician.

My research focuses on understanding drug sensitivity in bladder cancer and the most optimal application of immunotherapy. We are particularly interested in the neoadjuvant setting, where we aim to manipulate the tumor-immune microenvironment to improve the chances of inducing a durable response to immunotherapy.

Work Experience

2013 onwards: Medical oncologist and research group leader, both at the NKI

2011 - 2013: Medical oncology fellowship, NKI

2009 - 2011: Post-doctoral research fellow in the Rene Bernards lab, NKI. Functional genetic screens to identify modulators of sensitivity to targeted agents in breast and colon cancer

2005 - 2009: Internal medicine residency, Academic Medical Center, Amsterdam

2002 - 2004: Research fellowship at the Scott Kern lab, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore (USA). Supervisor: Prof. S.E. Kern. Investigating the role of defects in the homologous recombination repair pathway in pancreatic cancer. PhD at the University of Amsrterdam in 2005

2000 - 2002: Clinical internships, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands

May 1999 – Jan 2000 Research internship, Department of Neurosurgery, University of Mary¬land, Baltimore (USA). Supervisor: Prof. J.M. Simard

An in vivo experimental model for the effect of neurovascular endothelial damage on smooth muscle cells.

Michiel Van der Heijden

Group leader

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