Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Credit for Scientific Research for Prof. Ludo Peeters" "Ludo PEETERS" Econometrics "The scientific assignments aim to give full-time appointed members of the Senior academic staff from universities in the Flemish Community the opportunity to be fully devote to their research for 3 months to 1 year. Through funding from the FWO, they may be exempted from their teaching assignment. This sabbatical leave was assigned to Ludo Peeters." "Impact of forest conversion on the prevalence of Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato genotypes in the sheep tick Ixodes ricunus and the risk of Lyme disease" "Tick-borne diseases are a growing public health concern globally as their incidence is rising. However, the spatiotemporal dynamics of questing ticks infected with human pathogens such as the Lyme borreliosis bacteria, remain largely unclear. We investigated the transmission dynamics of common tick-borne pathogens, focusing mainly on Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato (U+2018BorreliaU+2019) and the impact of ecological interactions between ticks, hosts and forest types on Lyme borreliosis risk. Forest composition and structure have been shown to affect the density of ticks, but their impact on the prevalence of Borrelia in the ticks has not been investigated so far. The study of the impact of forest type on Lyme borreliosis risk is particularly important in the context of the ongoing conversion of homogeneous coniferous forests to more natural, mixed forests dominated by indigenous broadleaved trees in many regions in Europe. According to the dilution effect hypothesis, postulated in North America, a forest with a high diversity of hosts for ticks contains more hosts that are poorly capable of transmitting Borrelia to ticks compared to a forest with a species-poor host community, consisting mostly of transmission-competent host species. This hypothesis has not yet been tested in Europe, where different types of hosts transmit different Borrelia genospecies. In the Kempen, northern Belgium, we studied forest stands of four forest types: oak or pine stands, with or without a substantial shrub layer. These forest types are representative for the different stages in the process of forest conversion. In this part of the study, we focused on Borrelia afzelii, the most common Borrelia genospecies in Lyme borreliosis patients in Western Europe and transmitted to ticks by small rodents. We found that the density of Ixodes ricinus ticks or the infection prevalence of Borrelia in ticks from our study sites did not increase from 2009 to 2014, similar to the reported stable incidence of Lyme borreliosis and tick bites in Belgium. The density of ticks, rather than the infection prevalence of B. afzelii, was more important in explaining variation in the density of infected ticks and can thus be used as a predictor of disease risk. The density of ticks was higher in oak stands than in pine stands, but the prevalence of B. afzelii was highest in pine stands. We could not confirm the dilution effect hypothesis; the density of infected ticks, a commonly used risk measure in the literature, was not correlated with host diversity, and the host diversity did not differ between the forest types. Our results indicate differential host use by ticks in different habitats, with larvae feeding more often on small rodents in pine stands and more on other types of hosts, such as birds, which transmit genospecies other than B. afzelii, in oak stands. Besides in forests, the favourable habitat of I. ricinus, humans are also exposed to ticks and human pathogens in (sub)urban green spaces. We found many common human pathogens, such as Borrelia genospecies, Borrelia miyamotoi and Anaplasma phagocytophilum, in squirrels and ticks from hedgehogs collected in urban settings. Hence, humans are likely to encounter ticks infected with one or several pathogens while gardening or recreating in parks. We conclude that focusing on the dilution effect to reduce Lyme borreliosis risk is not an effective management option in our study region, and possibly in other European regions with similar forest communities. Instead of decreasing Lyme borreliosis risk, adding host species to the host community can even increase disease risk, by increasing the prevalence of Borrelia genospecies that give rise to clinical manifestations of Lyme borreliosis such as neuroborreliosis that are more severe compared to skin manifestations (mainly caused by B. afzelii). Lyme borreliosis prevention should therefore aim to reduce tick densities and the contact rate between ticks and humans. The risk for human exposure to Lyme borreliosis not only depends on the density of infected ticks but importantly also on the human-tick contact rate. Our results suggest that decreasing the density of (infected) ticks will rarely lead to a substantially lower Lyme borreliosis risk. Forest management can decrease the human-tick contact rate and the subsequent Lyme borreliosis risk by directing visitor flows, e.g. along points of attraction or marked-out routes, and by mowing the vegetation along trails." "Analysis of transferability of a Korean LUTI (Land-use and transportation interaction model) to Flanders" "Tom BELLEMANS" "Transportation Behaviour" "On February 19, 2015 the Research Council has approved the short stay of dr. Won Do Lee (Ajou University, Republic of Korea) at UHasselt chargeable to the BOF-program 'Short Stays'. During his stay, dr. Won Do Lee will perform research in collaboration with prof. Tom Bellemans (research group Trafic Savety). The stay will take place in 2015 and 2016." "Microfluidics for single-cell omics. the C1 Single-Cell Auto Prep System, BioMark HD System and IFC controllers (Fluidigm) for single-cell analyses" "Thierry Voet" "Laboratory for Molecular Cancer Biology (VIB-KU Leuven), Laboratory of Glia Biology (VIB-KU Leuven), Department of Human Genetics, Laboratory of Molecular Biology of Leukemia (VIB-KU Leuven), Laboratory of Ion Channel Research (VIB-KU Leuven)" "Advances in whole-genome and whole-transcriptome amplification have permitted the sequencing of the DNA and RNA present in a single cell, offering a window into the extent and nature of genomic and transcriptomic heterogeneity which occurs in both normal development and disease. Single-cell approaches are revolutionising our capacity to understand the scale of genomic, epigenomic and transcriptomic diversity that occurs during the lifetime of an individual organism in health and disease. C1-microfluidics allows to isolate up to 96 intact individual cells from a suspension, and to process the cells for genome or transcriptome sequencing. This microfluidics device provides the advantage of automated capturing of single cells, and subsequent nanoliter reaction chambers to process the nucleic acids of multiple individual cells in parallel under highly standardized conditions at significantly reduced reagent costs. The C1 coupled to the BIOMARK and IFC systems, allows high throughput targeted analysis of single-cell gene expression, miRNA expression and single-cell genotyping using nanofluidics, producing more data at drastically less cost." "Evolution en phylogeny of lianas in the genus Hydrangea sensu lato (Hydrangeaceae). A biomechanical, morphological and anatomical study in the framework of a molecular phylogeny" "This project will 1) show the phylogenetic relationships between the taxa of the tribe Hydrangeeae, based on micromorphological and molecular studies, 2) revise the American Hyrangea section Cornidia based on material to be collected in the wild, and 3) obtain insight in the evolution of growth forms in the tribe Hydragneeae based on biomechanical and anatomical studies." "W&T sholarship Luo Yu" "Dirk Inzé" "Department of Plant Biotechnology and Bioinformatics" "geen abstract" "Vortex Shunt - A Novel Prenatal Lower Urinary Tract Obstruction (LUTO) Vesico-amniotic Shunt (VAS)" "Jan Deprest" "Urogenital, Abdominal and Plastic Surgery" "As part of the Stanford Byers Center for Biodesign proposal “Vortex Shunt – A Novel Prenatal Lower Urinary Tract Obstruction (LUTO) Vesico-amniotic Shunt (VAS),” Dr. Jan Deprest will serve as a sub-PI for the animal studies evaluating the Vortex Shunt in a pre-clinical fetal sheep LUTO model. The goal of these animal studies is to provide sufficient pre-clinical data to obtain FDA clearance.Fetal lower urinary tract obstruction (LUTO) occurs in 2 to 3 cases per 10,000 births due to an obstruction of the fetal bladder outlet (urethra). As a consequence of the urinary obstruction, fetuses have reduced amniotic fluid, leading to pulmonary hypoplasia. In survivors, there is an increased risk of progressing to end-stage renal disease before or soon after birth.Because the diagnosis can be made prenatally by ultrasound, and because of the severity of the condition, fetal surgery, namely vesico-amniotic shunting (VAS) has been performed clinically and has been shown to reduce neonatal mortality related to pulmonary hypoplasia. The fetal intervention's main objective is to prevent severe pulmonary hypoplasia and possibly end-stage renal disease by resolving or bypassing the obstruction. Unfortunately, existing VAS shunts have major limitations including high dislodgement and migration risks and given the invasive nature of VAS and associated complications, VAS is usually reserved for the most severe LUTO cases. In addition, while the effect of VAS on mortality and respiratory morbidity has been shown, the effect on renal dysfunction, primarily long-term renal impairment remains controversial.A recently developed new LUTO shunt, also known as the “Vortex shunt” has improved technical specifications and may lead to lower in-utero dislodgement and migration rates. This in turn may lead to improved neonatal renal impairment and may ultimately lead to VAS being offered to more LUTO cases." "Vortex Shunt - A novel prenatal lower urinary tract obstrucrion (LUTO)." "Jan Deprest" "Urogenital, Abdominal and Plastic Surgery" "A recently developed new LUTO shunt also known as the Vortex shunt has improved technical specifications and may lead to lower in-utero dislodgement and migration rates." "Personalized urotherapy at home to improve the care pathway of children with Lower Urinary Tract (LUT) dysfunctions." "Lukas Van Campenhout" "Social Epidemiology & Health Policy (SEHPO), Antwerp Surgical Training, Anatomy and Research Centre (ASTARC), Product development" "The products and services supporting urotherapy play a crucial role in the effectiveness of therapy. The traditional urotherapy products are often paper-based solutions and the little technology used, can be perceived as outdated. For example, traditional paper-based bladder diaries are described by patients as cumbersome and inconvenient, resulting in low patient compliance. Several innovations have been introduced to overcome these obstacles, such as digital bladder diaries and a urotherapy gaming application. However, all had limited or no effect. A potential reason is the design methodology behind these innovations, which focuses on scientific evidence to make sure the design complies with evidencebased guidelines. In contrast, user needs are not or insufficiently investigated during the design process, resulting in innovations that do not fulfill users' expectations. We believe the design of effective healthcare innovations requires a new approach that combines objective knowledge (Evidence Based Design) with subjective user experience (User Experience Design). It is our hypothesis that the combination of both design methodologies will lead to stronger design propositions, enhancing treatment outcomes and patient experience. In this research project we will investigate the impact of this integrated approach by applying it to the design of an ecosystem of interlinked products and services to offer personalized urotherapy at home." "Novel fetal management strategies of gastroschisis and urinary tract obstruction" "Jan Deprest" "Urogenital, Abdominal and Plastic Surgery" "Fetal surgery has become a reality, and the introduction of minimally invasive techniques broadens potentially the scope of conditions. In urinary tract obstruction the main obstacles are (non-invasive) assessment of deterioration of renal function and technical limitations to explore the bladder neck at the time of in utero surgery. Gastroschisis can technically also be covered, though formal assessment of the benefits must still take place."