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Each year, Clarivate publishes a ‘highly cited researchers’ list recognizing pioneers in their field. This list contains researchers who have demonstrated significant influence through the publication of multiple papers, highly cited by their peers, during the last decade (2009-2019). No less than 19 VIB researchers are part of this highly acclaimed group of influential scientists.

Op het eerste zicht lijkt evolutie een verhaal van continue, stapsgewijze vooruitgang. Wie verzwakt, verliest volgens Darwins wet van survival of the fittest. Toch kunnen genetische defecten, die een organisme in eerste instantie verzwakken, de overlevingskansen op langere termijn vergroten. Deze opmerkelijke bevindingen van bio-ingenieurs aan KU Leuven en VIB betekenen een belangrijke stap in ons begrip van evolutie. 

Each year, the European Research Council awards Proof of Concept grants to ERC grant holders who wish to take their ERC research one step further towards application. This year, no less than three VIB principal investigators have received an ERC PoC grant: Prof. Kevin Verstrepen (VIB-KU Leuven Center for Microbiology), Prof. Patrik Verstreken, and Prof. Stein Aerts (both from the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Brain and Disease Research).

In 2012, the European Union MetaCardis consortium, comprising 14 research groups from six European countries with multidisciplinary expertise set out to investigate a potential role of the gut microbiota in the development of cardio-metabolic diseases. 

A research team at the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Microbiology and the KU Leuven Department of Biology showed that, contrary to generally held belief, most components of essential oils could meet the criteria set for drug candidates. Essential oil components are the constituents of essential oils, which are complex mixtures of plant metabolites obtained by dry or steam distillation, or by citrus peel pressing.

Microbiome specialist MRM Health enters into its first industry collaboration with DuPont Nutrition & Biosciences in the field of metabolic diseases. Furthermore, MRM Health has raised more than €14 million to advance its in-house clinical and preclinical development programs in the field of microbiome-based therapeutics and strengthens its partnership with VIB, KU Leuven and Ghent University.

Each year, Clarivate analytics identifies the world’s most influential researchers who have been cited most frequently by their peers over the last decade. No less than 18 VIB researchers are part of this highly acclaimed group of influential scientists.

Today marks the start of a recruitment drive to find participants for a special Flemish research project: FLORA. The project, an initiative of SmartWithFood (a spin-off of Colruyt Group) in collaboration with KU Leuven and VIB wants to investigate whether personalised digital nutritional advice can have a positive effect on health and intestinal microbiota. For a period of 3 months, participants will receive personalised nutritional tips via an app. 

Vandaag start de rekrutering van deelnemers voor een bijzonder Vlaams onderzoeksproject: FLORA. Het project, een initiatief van SmartWithFood een spin-off van Colruyt Group, in samenwerking met de KU Leuven en VIB (Vlaams Instituut voor Biotechnologie), wil onderzoeken of gepersonaliseerde en digitaal geleverde voedingsadviezen een positief effect kunnen hebben op de gezondheid en de darmflora. 

A team of researchers from the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Microbiology found that house flies are real taxi’s for microbes.  And, they do not care much about which passengers they are taking along for the ride.  Bacteria, fungi and even pathogenic microbes are all transported on the flies’ bodies.  Inside the flies, however, the diversity of microbes is lower, suggesting that only specific microbes survive. The findings will be published in BMC Microbiome.