Prof.dr. Viggo van Tendeloo, PhD
Viggo Van Tendeloo advises DC
Prime on strategic issues regarding dendritic cell loading and cancer indications suitable for treatment with dendritic cell vaccines. He is a professor at the Vaccine & Infectious Disease Institute of the University of Antwerp, and Scientific Director of the Center for Cell Therapy and Regenerative Medicine at the Antwerp University Hospital, Belgium. Dr. Van Tendeloo is an internationally recognized expert in clinical grade manufacturing of dendritic cell vaccines, and in treatment of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) using autologous dendritic cell vaccines. He (co)authored over 65 research papers on cancer vaccines and related topics.
Prof.dr. Walter Urba, MD, PhD
Prof. dr. Urba is Director of the Providence Cancer Center and cancer research for the Earle A. Chiles Research Institute in Portland, OR. He has a long track record in groundbreaking immunotherapy research, acting as principal investigator on local, national and international trials of cytokines, antibodies and cancer vaccines. He has been an advisor to the immunotherapists of the VUmc for many years, and now advises DC
Prime as well. Dr. Urba is past chair of the FDA Cellular, Tissue and Gene Therapy Advisory Committee and currently serves on the National Cancer Institute’s Board of Scientific Counselors for Clinical Services and Epidemiology. He has (co)authored more than 200 publications.
Prof.dr. Pedro Romero, MD
Pedro Romero is Head of Clinical Onco-Immunology at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research (LICR) in Epalinges, Switzerland, and Professor at the Faculty of Biology and Medicine at the University of Lausanne. He was educated as an MD in Colombia, and performed his research training at New York University medical school before joining the LICR. Pedro Romero is a specialist in peptide-based immunotherapy and has made numerous contributions to the field of cancer immunology. He holds a number of patents and has (co)authored published over 160 papers.
Prof.dr. Sjoerd van den Burg, PhD
Sjoerd van der Burg is a professor in experimental cancer immunology and therapy at the department of clinical oncology of the Leiden University Medical Center, Sjoerd received his Ph.D. in Immunology from the University of Leiden, the Netherlands. His research interest is in tumour immunopathology with an emphasis on the local immune response, T-helper cells, regulatory T cells and cytotoxic T cells in tumour immunity, as well as in immunotherapy of cancer, in particular the development of therapeutic vaccine strategies and the adoptive transfer of ex-vivo expanded T cells. He has extensive experience with the monitoring of human T cell responses and exploits this to guide the development of therapeutic vaccines against cancer.
Prof.dr. Rik J Scheper, MD, PhD, Co-founder of DCprime
Rik Scheper is an immunologist and experimental pathologist in the Department of Pathology of VUmc in Amsterdam. In close collaborations with several clinical departments, Rik Scheper leads research groups in the fields of multidrug resistance, tumour-immunology and immuno-dermatology, all at the VUmc. Rik Scheper was awarded many national and international grants to support his research, and worked closely with a number of companies, including Boehringer Ingelheim, Eurocetus, Numico, Organon Teknika, Intracell, Coley Pharmaceutical Group, Medarex, Kirin Breweries and Solvay. As (co-)inventor, he contributed in collaborations with industry to the development of several patents. He also is the CEO-CSO of VUmc spin-off company A-Skin, a tissue engineering company.
Dr. Tanja de Gruijl, PhD
Tanja de Gruijl advises DC
Prime on questions related to the current R&D activities, and to immune-monitoring. She heads the DC research group and tumour immuno-monitoring unit of the Division of Immunotherapy of the Department of Medical Oncology at VUmc in Amsterdam, and has more than 15 years track record in translational immunology. Tanja de Gruijl performed the original research that led to the discovery that the normal functions of DC from human blood can be mimicked by certain cell lines. Her main line of research is the in vivo modulation of DC subsets for tumour immunotherapeutic purposes, through targeted adenovirus-mediated gene transfer and local cytokine administration.