Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) is a rare disease. The primary reason being that patients decease rapidly: consequently they stay low number. It sounds cruel and it is. Neurobiologist Ludo Van Den Bosch and neurologist Philip Van Damme eagerly keep investigating the mechanisms that cause ALS and ways to interfere. Van Den Bosch does it from its lab in the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Brain & Disease Research and in close collaboration with the ALS Liga. He already received multiple prestigious awards for this.

Van Den Bosch: “The financial injection of Opening the future gave us a kick-start to work with induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). Together with the Stem Cell Institute Leuven we transform skin cells of patients into motorneurons and muscles. By this, we can make a human model in the lab.” In that model, Van Den Bosch discovered that something goes wrong in the transport of nerve cells to muscles, and that this can be restored.

From his side, Philip Van Damme treats ALS patients in the hospital and conducts both clinical trials and lab research. In the latter, he uses the spatial multi-omics infrastructure that was co-financed by Opening the future. In the coming years, he hopes to discover the role of glia cells in ALS.

The additional value of technology and collaboration with engineers is key. Van Den Bosch studies human cells in microfluidic chambers, an advanced version of the plastic culture dish. “Those devices are 3D printed in a cleanroom. Then  imec inserts electrodes into them. Doing so, you develop a chip that can measure muscle contraction.” Philip Van Damme concludes: “We are at a cross road. To make use of the technological revolutions in a timely manner, we are in a good position to obtain results.”

Translation: Dirk De Valck

Source: KU Leuven – Opening the future