Snijder Group

Systems Biology of Molecular and Cellular Physiology

We are interested in deciphering how cells work from a top-down point of view, focusing on the molecular networks and organizational principles that drive cellular behavior in health and disease.

To pursue this question we apply high-throughput automated microscopy, computer vision and machine learning, and integrative genomics and metabolomics, to the systematic analysis of human blood cells and various model systems.

Automated imaging of human blood cells allows us to characterize the ex vivo response of individual people to thousands of (potential) drug treatments or perturbations, over millions of cells, and with spatial and subcellular resolution. This leads to unprecedented functional insights with direct applications in personalized medicine, particularly relevant to oncology and immunology. Integration with genome-wide transcriptomics and quantitative lipidomics enables a top-down view on the molecular players regulating the observed cellular behavior. Read more