News
What's happing in the BMT group?
2024
New Year Workshop & Party
In the first week of January the BMT team attended a New Year Resolution Workshop to further optimize our teamwork. Afterwards, we celebrated the start of 2024 with a dinner and party organized by Rona.
2023
Marta Cerruti Visits Radboudumc
From October 30 till November 1 Marta Cerruti, professor at the Department of Mining and Materials Engineering at McGill University (Canada) visited the BMT group. She visited the departments of Dentistry, Cardiology and Medical BioSciences, had a tour at the Electron Microscopy Center, and gave a lecture about her work in biomaterials for bone mineralization and cardiovascular calcifications.
BMT Visits ICCBMT
From 22 till 27 October, part of the BMT group visited the 14th International Conference on the Chemistry and Biology of Mineralized Tissues (ICCBMT). We enjoyed a week full of interesting presentations and poster talks, concluded by a keynote lecture by Melinda Duer. All attending members of our group presented their work in an oral presentation and we finished with a dinner where Chenglong, Robin and Judith received one of the young investigator grants.
Interview Nico in Bionieuws
International Microscopy Congress (IMC20)
From 10 to 15 September, Nico attended the 20th International Microscopy Congress in Busan, Korea. It was a week full of developments and breakthroughs in microscopy. He also shared our work on a correlative imaging workflow in which multiple microscopy modalities are combined to enable 3D live to cryo microscopy in biological tissues.
Visit to IUPAC-CHAINS 2023
From the 21st to the 25st of August Luco, Robin and Judith visited IUPAC-CHAINS2023 in The Hague. Luco presented his work on the influence of glycosylation on collagen mineralization in an oral presentation on Monday. On Thursday, Robin shared his data on Raman imaging in aortic valve stenosis in a talk and Judith had a poster presentation about the role of serum proteins in bone mineralization.
Robin Presented His Research in Radbode Podcast
Recently, Robin has recorded a podcast about his research into osteogenesis imperfecta (OI, also known as brittle bone disease) for the Radbode Podcast. In this podcast he talks about the use of Raman and electron microscopy to study bone fractures in OI patients. Are you interested? You can find the episode here.
Robin's Paper Accepted in Advanced Functional Materials
On the 21st of May, Robin's first paper was accepted in Advanced Functional Materials. This paper shows the application of a 3D cell free model combined with live Raman microscopy to study the infiltration of mineral in a demineralized bone matrix. Congratulations Robin!
Commissioning of the TEM
Last Friday, June 16, the installation of the Talos TEM was finalized. After Luco unpacked the last part and Nico signed the paperwork, the training on the Talos will now be started.
BMT Day Out
On 6 June the BMT group attended a teambuilding day. We played a couple of team games, learned how to us a "skippybal" with four people at once and built a huge Jenga tower. After this we toured through the Ooijpolder on electrical steps and we finished the day with a nice BBQ. Thanks for organizing Rona and Robin!
Publication about our cryoCLEM Workflow in Communications Biology
On May 11, the first paper about the use of our cryoCLEM workflow was published in Communications Biology! This paper describes the use of a FinderTOP to correlate fluorescence microscopy data to 3D FIB-SEM imaging in cryogenic conditions. You can find the paper here.
Welcome Back Marcos!
Starting from the 1st of May, Marcos has joined the BMT group again. After finishing his PhD at São Paulo University, he will now start working with organ-on-a-chip devices to study (pathological) calcifation in the heart valve.
Luco, Robin and Judith Presented at the Radboudumc PhD Retreat
At 1 and 2 May the first Radboudumc PhD retreat of the year took place. Luco, Robin and Judith all presented the work of their PhD projects in an oral presentation. It was a very interactive meeting with a workshop many posters and short presentations.
Rona Presented at the Kleindiek User Meeting
At the 25th of April Rona presented at the Kleindiek user meeting. She showed her work on (cryo-)lamella preparation and liftout with the Kleindiek gripper using biological samples in the FIB-SEM.
Delivery of the New Transmission Electron Microscope
Our patience has been tested for a while, but the day has finally come. Funded by an NWO-groot grant, manufactured by FEI, shipped all the way from the Czech Republic, it eventually arrived in the EMC at the 31st of March… our new Talos transmission electron microscope!
Even though all
dimensions were carefully measured, we eagerly watched as the TEM fitted
precisely through every door and elevator to arrive at its final destination.
In the next weeks the TEM will be installed and tested. Thereafter it will
be used to image beam sensitive materials in liquid phase.
"An Organoid for Woven Bone" Top Downloaded Article
In 2021, the paper "An Organoid for Woven Bone (Akiva A. et al.)" was published in Advanced Functional Materials. In the year after pulbication, this paper was amongst the most downloaded articles in this journal. Congratulations!
Nico Interviewed by VitroTEM
New Group Member: Ben
Starting March 1, Ben joins our team as a research technician. He will focus mainly on the use of (cryo-)fluorescence microscopy in our correlative imaging workflow. Welcome Ben!
Goodbye Party Marit
From the 1st of March Marit will start working as an application specialist in Delmic. Therefore, we organized a goodbye party last week. We had a fun evening of bowling, followed by a nice Italian dinner. We wish you all the best at Delmic Marit!
Nico Presented at EuroBioImaging Pub
Euro-BioImaging organizes regular seminars about imaging. Last week, Nico presented our work on the development of a cryo-corellative workflow to study biological materials in the Volume EM series.
Bone-on-a-Chip in De Gelderlander
At the 23rd of January regional newspaper Dagblad de Gelderlander published an article about Judith's image "Shedding light on bone development" of a living bone-on-a-chip cell culture on their front page. The full article can be found here: link
Image Award Judith
2022
Christmas Party
To finalize the year and celebrate the holidays, Luco and Rona organized a Christmas party for the BMT group. We all dressed up and enjoyed dinner together at this nice evening. The BMT group wishes you nice holidays and all the best for 2023!
Nico visited PhD defense in Leeds
On 28 November Nico visited the PhD defense of Stephanie Foster at the University of Leeds. She defended her thesis about the use of advanced microscopy to study bioinspired materials formation in the group of professor Fiona Meldrum.
Goodbye party Marcos
After a year full of matrix vesicles and TEM, Marcos will return to Brazil to finish his PhD research at São Paulo University. Therefore, we celebrated Marcos' goodbye party with some glow in the dark minigolf and a nice dinner. All the best with the last part of your PhD Marcos!
Visit to Thermo Fisher Scientific in Brno
In November, Nico and Rona payed a visit to the factory of Thermo Fisher Scientific in Brno (Czech Republic). Here, they had a look at the building of the new Talos F200C G2 that will be installed in the EM center in the beginning of 2023.
Goodbye party Deniz
From the 1st of November, Deniz leaves the BMT group and starts working as a cryo application specialist in the life science department of Delmic. Therefore, Deniz organized a goodbye party and we enjoyed some nice drinks and food together.
Melinda Duer visited the BMT group
As part of the Radboud Exellence Initiative Melinda Duer joined the BMT group in October and November as a visiting professor. During her stay in the Netherlands she also visited the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen and Dutch NMR Discussion group to present her work on the application of solid state NMR to study healthy as well as diseased tissues.
Lecture by Nico at GRC Liquid Phase EM
At 12 October Nico gave a talk at the Gordon Research Conference on Liquid Phase EM. This conference took place in Ventura (California, USA). Nico's talk was covering the topic of "Imaging Collagen Mineralization in Aqueous Samples".Poster prize for Marit and talk by Judith at NWO Biophysics
At 10 and 11 October Robin, Marit, Judith and Mariska visited NWO Biophysics. We heard a lot about new developments in the imaging field. Judith shared her results in a talk and Robin and Marit presented a poster. At the end of the conference, Marit was announced as the winner of the second poster prize. Congratulations Marit!
Lecture by Nico at COMULIS Conference Nicosia
In the end of September, Nico visited the COMULIS Conference in Cyprus to present the group's work on the (cryo-)CLEM workflow. He showed our most recent results from correlative live and cryogenic 3D imaging.
'Heavy mice and lighter things', a captivating title for a captivating lecture by Melinda Duer
Prof. Melinda Duer is a visiting professor from the University of Cambridge as part of the Radboud Exellence Initiative. In one of the last days of her visit she gave an outstanding lecture titled 'Heavy mice and lighter things: developing models of extracellular matrix in health and ageing'. She described interdisciplinary approaches to study the extracellular matrix, while amplifying the power of solid state NMR. We are already looking forward to welcome Melinda back later this year!
Goodbye party Anat
From the 1st of April Anat will take on a new challenge in the R&D team of Leica Micosystems. This moment couldn't pass without a nice goodbye party. The drinks, Israeli food, camp fire and karaoke did a good job in relieving the pain of Anat's departure from the group. We wish you all the best of luck in your future endavours, and as Anat would say: 'So long, and thank you for the fish'.
Deniz gave a peek behind the curtain(ing)!
We all show beautiful images and videos. But this is certainly not what we get directly from the microscope. This is were Deniz comes in. She explained in her lecture at the EMBL conference the secret behind image post-processing - a peek behind the curtain(ing).
Lecture by Marit at EMBL conference
The topic of the EMBL conference, organised from 13 to 16 March, was ''from 3D light to 3D electron microscopy''. This was the prefect setting for Marit to present her newest CLEM work on bacteria. Marit managed to intrigue the audience with her beautiful images and videos.
Marit de Beer speaks at the NEMI day
A day organized by NEMI, the Dutch electron microscopy infrastructure, full of interesting talks with the overlapping theme ''Crossing Borders''. One of these lecture, about 3D-cryo-CLEM on bacteria, will be held by Marit de Beer.
Goodbye party Elena
Elena will soon be taking on a new challenge in Malaga. Sadly, this means she will be leaving Radboudumc. This calls of course for a goodbye party. During our dinner/ball-game we showed that we can handle the Jeu de Boule balls just as well as the bowling balls. After the game, we had the opportunity to enjoy some drinks in the city center. Rumor has it that there even was some dancing involved..
Travel grant for Judith!
Judith received a travel grant form the organization of the Applied Bioinformatics in Life Sciences conference. The conference will be held in the beautiful city Leuven in March. Enjoy your trip!
2021
New group member: Chenglong
We welcome the newest member of our research group: Chenglong Li. Chenglong will stay with us for 2 years as a visiting PhD candidate from Nanjing University.
Poster Prize for Judith at Dutch Biophysics!
Judith won a prize in the Dutch Biophysics poster competition! Her well designed poster entitled ''Analysis of collagen secretion and deposition pathways in osteoblasts'' attracted the eyes of the jury and resulted in the 3rd place.
Travel grant for Luco to visit LP-EM conference
Luco received the Raboud Internationalisation Grant for outgoing PhD candidates to visit the 2022 Liquid Phase Electron Microscopy Gordon Conference. The conference will be held in Ventura (California) in the end of January.
Lecture Anat Akiva at CISCEM
Oriented attachment (OA) of protein nanocystrals was observed in molecular resolution by Nico Sommerdijk and co-workers using cryo-TEM. In the paper, published in Nature Communications, they show the initial formation of facetted nanocrystals that merge lattices by means of OA alignment well before contact is made, highlighting the role of the interaction between crystalline nuclei.
Lecture Judith Schaart at CHAINS 2021 conference
Researchers all over The Netherlands working in various disciplines related to chemistry joined the CHAINS 2021 conference. In the parallel session about cellular biochemistry Judith gave a nice lecture about the mechanisms of bone mineralization.
Prof. Duer awarded the Radboud Excellence Initiative Professorship
Prof. Melinda Duer (University of Cambridge) has been awarded the Radboud Excellence Initiative Professorship. Professor Duer pioneers the use of Solid State NMR to study molecular scale interactions in biological materials (Melinda Duer - Wikipedia). She will be joining our group for 5 months in the coming 2 years to study the common mechanisms of bone formation and cardiovascular calcification.
TURBO grant for bone-on-a-chip model
Nico Sommerdijk and Anat Akiva together with their collaborators from Twente (Pascal Jonkheijm & Andries van der Meer) have been awarded the TURBO grant to develop a bone-on-a-chip model. In this project, the UT's knowledge of organ-on-a-chip development comes together with the bone organoid and live-imaging expertise at Radboudumc.
Protein nucleation via oriented attachment
On
September 8th Anat gave an invited lecture (Live!) on the first day
of the 5th International Conference on In-Situ and Correlative
Electron Microscopy (About - CISCEM 2021) in Paris.
New group member: Marcos
Marcos Eufrásio Cruz from São Paulo University will join our group for one year as a visiting PhD candidate. Marcos will work on collagen mineralization using extracellular matrix vesicles. Welcome Marcos and good luck!
New LP-EM featured in C2W
The journal of the Royal Netherlands Chemical Society, C2W, recently published an article about the new TEM that will be installed in Radboudumc next year. A group of scientists, including Elena Macías Sánchez and Nico Sommerdijk, were awarded the NWO groot grant to aquire an EM specialized for liquid phase TEM on biological materials. Read more in the article!
Lecture Robin van der Meijden at Dutch Biophysics conference
Robin was selected to give a lecture at the Dutch Biophysics conference. During the parallel session about Assembly and Complexes on Monday the 11th of October he set out to convince the audience that bone matrix mineralization is controlled by physical chemistry instead of biology. A succesfull mission!
Lecture Judith Schaart
On the 22nd of September Judith Schaart will give a lecture entitled ''Developing a bone-on-a-chip to study bone
formation pathways''. The lecture we be part of an online seminar about stem cell-derived organoids to
model human diseases.
Bowling!
It has been speculated for a long time, hips have been replaced and the trash talk has already begun. On the 25th of September it will finally happen. The BMT group will participate in a fierce competition of BOWLING! The stakes have never been this high because the winner will be crowned BMT Master of the bowling alley.
Captivating Lecture by Prof. Melinda Duer
On Thursday the 2nd of September, Prof. Melinda Duer from the University of Cambridge gave a fascinating lecture in Radboud Research Rounds Plus addition for Radboud research from research themes Nanomedicine and regenerative medicine. This event, hosted by Anat Akiva and Daniela Wilson, was themed around ''calcification of tissues: mechanism of investigation''. We are thrilled to see Prof. Duer more often in Nijmegen, as a visiting professor starting from January 2022.
Hopefully, the Radboud Research Rounds will be held in real life again to continue the exciting discussions accompanied by drinks.
Amazing Group BBQ
On the 9th of July we had our long expected group BBQ. The weather was fantastic, the beers were cold and the food was nice. All in all an amazing event!
A Bone Organoid
Anat and colleagues published a paper in Advanced Funtional Materials about the formation of a woven bone organoid. This 3D model allows for the study of biochemical processes in bone formation. Intrigued? For more details read the paper.
Elena awarded with the Marie Curie Fellowship
Elena has been awarded a prestigious Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship, to develop a two-year project investigating the process of bone mineralization. Congratulations Elena!
For more information click the link
Visit Nadja Fratzl Zelmann
Prof. Nadja Fratzl Zelman, accompanied by her colleagues, visited our reseach group on the 19th of May. She gave a talk about the work she is doing at the Ludwig Boltzmann-Institute of Osteology. The afternoon was closed after a interesting discussion.
Visit Steve Weiner
On the 7th of April Prof. dr. Steve Weiner form the Weizmann Institute (virtually) visited the BMT research group. The whole institute was invited to his fascinating lecture about the 3D structure of bone and the potential of FIB SEM.
EM Center featured in the Dutch scientific news program 'Atlas'
The Electron Microscopy Center was visited by the Dutch TV program Atlas. View the item (in Dutch) via this link (skip to minute 22.50).
New group member: Martijn
Martijn Martens joins our research group. Martijn has started on the first of June as a TEM technician.
New group member: Rona
Rona Roverts started in the BMT group on May 1st to develop cryoFIB-SEM for studying collagen mineralization. Welcome Rona!
Marit successfully defended her PhD!
On the 28th of April Marit successfully defended her PhD thesis entiteled "Developments and applications for protein-based probes for correlative microscopy".
Congrats to Dr. Marit!