Hans_Clevers

Hans Clevers

Hans Clevers

Dutch molecular genetics and stem cell researcher

This article is about a Dutch molecular genetics and stem cell researcher. For the purported horse mathematician, see Clever Hans.

Johannes (Hans) Carolus Clevers (born 27 March 1957)[2][3] is a Dutch molecular geneticist, cell biologist and stem cell researcher. He became the Head of Pharma, Research and Early Development, and a member of the Corporate Executive Committee, of the Swiss healthcare company Roche in 2022.[7][8] Previously, he headed a research group at the Hubrecht Institute for Developmental Biology and Stem Cell Research[9] and at the Princess Máxima Center [nl];[10] he remained as an advisor and guest scientist or visiting researcher to both groups.[7] He is also a Professor in Molecular Genetics at the University of Utrecht.[8]

Quick Facts Born, Nationality ...

Early life and education

Hans Clevers was born in Eindhoven, the Netherlands in 1957.[4] He began studying biology at the University of Utrecht in 1975, but also started taking medicine in 1978,[7] in part due to his interest and in part because his friends and brothers were in the medical profession.[11] He spent 1 year in Nairobi, Kenya, and half a year at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, United States, for biology rotations.[11][12] He received a Doctoraal (equivalent to an MSc) in Biology in 1982 and an Artsexamen (equivalent to an MD) in 1984. Mostly because of his research background, Clevers was selected for a training position in paediatrics, and then went to pursue a PhD in 1985, under the supervision of Rudy Ballieux.[6][13][14] He obtained his PhD 1 year later.[7][11]

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Career

After his PhD, Clevers went to the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute as a postdoctoral researcher at Cox Terhorst's group.[8][11][15][16] In 1989, he returned to the Netherlands, joining his alma mater, the University of Utrecht, as an assistant professor at the Department of Clinical Immunology.[8]

In 1991, Clevers became a professor and the chair of the Department of Immunology at the University of Utrecht.[8] He moved to the University Medical Center Utrecht in 2002 as a professor in molecular genetics, and started his lab at the Hubrecht Institute for Developmental Biology and Stem Cell Research (Hubrecht Institute).[7] At the same time, he took up the position of Director of the Hubrecht Institute.[8]

In March 2012, Clevers was elected the president of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, succeeding Robbert Dijkgraaf.[17][18] His term concluded in 2015, and he started another lab at the Princess Máxima Center [nl],[8] focusing on childhood cancer,[10] and became the Director Research and Chief Scientific Officer there until 2019.[8]

Clevers left University Medical Center Utrecht and was appointed Professor in Molecular Genetics at the University of Utrecht in 2020.[7]

In 2022, Clevers joined the Swiss healthcare company Roche as its Head of Pharma, Research and Early Development and a member of its Corporate Executive Committee.[19][20] He remains an advisor and guest scientist or visiting researcher to his research groups at the Princess Máxima Center and Hubrecht Institute.[9][10]

Since 2017, Clevers is an investigator at the Oncode Institute in Utrecht.[7][21]

Clevers has served at a number of scientific organizations, including on the board of directors of the American Association for Cancer Research (2013-2016),[22] and the Scientific Advisory Board of the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (2005-2015),[8] the Research Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna (2015-2021)[23] and the Francis Crick Institute in London.[24] He is currently on the advisory board of various scientific journals, including The EMBO Journal,[25] Disease Models & Mechanisms,[26] Cell,[27] Cell Stem Cell[28] and EMBO Molecular Medicine.[29] From 2014 to 2022, he was also on the editorial committee of the Annual Review of Cancer Biology.[7]

Outside the academia, Clevers has been a scientific advisor to numerous biotechnology companies.[7] He also co-founded California-based Surrozen[30] in 2016[31] and Shanghai-based D1 Medical Technology[32] in 2019.[33]

Hans Clevers interviewed for the Dutch television show The Mind of the Universe

Research

Clevers's early career focused on the Wnt signaling pathway.[34] His group identified the TCF1 protein, a member of the TCF gene family and a crucial downstream component of the Wnt signaling pathway, making it central in immune responses, embryonic development and tissue repair.[35] His interest in the gastrointestinal tract began with the discovery that another TCF family member, the TCF4 protein, is required in forming intestinal crypts.[36] Collaborating with Bert Vogelstein, he found that in colon cancer where the APC gene is doubly mutated, TCF family members activate catenin beta-1, which then enhances the expression of many genes that cause cancer transformation,[37] connecting the Wnt signaling pathway with colon cancer.

In 2007, Clevers's group identified a marker for stem cells of the small and large intestines, LGR5, itself also a target of the Wnt signaling pathway.[38] This led to his finding that LGR5 is a stem cell marker in other organs as well, including the stomach[39] and hair follicles.[40]

Building on this discovery, in 2009, his group published a landmark paper, describing for the first time how organoids, which are 3-dimensional in vitro structures that behave anatomically and molecularly like the organ from which they are derived, were generated from adult stem cells, creating organoids of the small intestine.[41] Clevers's group has applied this technology to culturing organoids from other organs, such as the stomach[39] and liver,[42] as well as from various cancer types, including cancer of the breast[43] and the ovaries.[44] This platform has since been applied in personalized medicine, by generating organoids from specific patients to screen for drugs.[45][46] This is not limited to cancer but is applicable to other diseases as well (for example, cystic fibrosis).[47] His current major research interest is in using organoids derived from adult stem cells to study the molecular mechanism of tissue and cancer development.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Clevers's group modelled the infection of SARS-CoV-2 using lung organoids.[48]

Honours and awards

References

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