News

In honour of the presentation of the VNVA Els Borst Prize for her oeuvre, Prof Marlies Bongers is organising the symposium "menstruation in RED on the agenda" on 1 October.

In women trying to conceive, 1-3% experience repeated miscarriages. For more than 50% of these women, a cause for the miscarriages has yet to be found. New research from Maastricht University (UM) and the Maastricht University Medical Centre+ (MUMC+) shows that the immune system’s Natural Killer (NK) cells may be involved. In women with repeated miscarriages, the NK cells have different characteristics.

The European Commission has awarded €23 million to set up a new platform for drug repurposing: the use of existing drugs in diseases other than those for which they were originally developed. In the next seven years UM will develop the platform REPO4EU (precision drug REPurpOsing for Europe) together with various international partners. A congress in Maastricht held on 2-3 September kicked off the project.

Demissionary Minister of Education, Culture and Science Ingrid van Engelshoven will open ETpathfinder in Maastricht this afternoon. The state-of-the-art physics laboratory will serve as a testing ground for the development of technologies for future gravitational wave detectors.

UM President Martin Paul received the badge of honour ('erespeld) of the city of Venlo on 7 September from Mayor Scholten.

Scientists and cardiologists have known for decades that once a piece of heart muscle has died, for example due to a heart attack, it will never grow back. However, a research group from Maastricht University led by Professor Leon de Windt has now shown that by tinkering with microRNAs, heart muscle cells can indeed be prompted to regenerate. The research was published earlier this month in Nature Communications.

Scientists based in the border area of the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany will work together to gain more insight into the functioning of the microbiome: the trillions of bacteria, viruses, fungi and other microbes that live in and on our bodies. To this end, the researchers are today launching the Euregional Microbiome Center.

BASF’s vegetable seeds business and Maastricht University signed a Memorandum of Understanding to collaborate in the Brightlands Future of Farming Institute (BFFI). As of mid-2021 it will start its activities in a new facility at the premises of the Brightlands Campus Greenport Venlo, The Netherlands.