Cure Alzheimer's Fund Cure Alzheimer's Fund

Maarten Dewilde, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor in the Laboratory for Therapeutic and Diagnostic Antibodies, KU Leuven, Belgium

Maarten Dewilde obtained his B.S. from the University of Leuven (KU Leuven), Belgium, in 2003 and obtained his Ph.D. in pharmaceutical sciences at the same university in 2008. After earning his Ph.D. he left academia to join Ablynx, a pharmaceutical company specializing in developing therapeutic nanobodies (camelid-derived antibody fragments) against a broad range of diseases. As a lead scientist he successfully guided multiple projects through their discovery pipeline. In 2014 he went back to academia to join the Laboratory for the Research of Neurodegenerative Diseases (KULeuven) headed by Prof. Dr. Bart De Strooper. The primary interest of this laboratory is to unravel the fundamental molecular processes that underlie neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, and to use this knowledge to develop innovative strategies to slow down or cure these devastating diseases. Professor De Strooper and Dr. Dewilde teamed up to develop nanobodies against central nervous system (CNS)-related targets and to explore their potential to act as a generic shuttle to transport vital drugs over the blood-brain barrier.

Related Research:

Novel Entry Routes for Therapeutic Biologicals to the Brain Maarten Dewilde Bart De Strooper 2020-12-18 Nanobodies to Cross the Blood-Brain Barrier Bart De Strooper Maarten Dewilde 2016-09-01

Funded Research

These projects were made possible from Cure Alzheimer's Fund support.

Project Description Researchers Funding
Novel Entry Routes for Therapeutic Biologicals to the Brain 2020, 2022

$345,000
Nanobodies to Cross the Blood-Brain Barrier 2016, 2017

$300,000

Selected Publications

These published papers resulted from Cure Alzheimer’s Fund support.

Wouters, Y., Jaspers, T., De Strooper, B., & Dewilde, M. Identification and in vivo characterization of a brain-penetrating nanobody, Fluids and Barriers of the CNS, October 14, 2020, Read More

Rué, L., Jaspers, T., Degors, I. M. S., Noppen, S., Schols, D., De Strooper, B., & Dewilde, M. Novel Human/Non-Human Primate Cross-Reactive Anti-Transferrin Receptor Nanobodies for Brain Delivery of Biologics, Pharmaceutics, June 16, 2023, Read More

Wouters, Y., Jaspers, T., Rué, L., Serneels, L., De Strooper, B., & Dewilde, M. VHHs as tools for therapeutic protein delivery to the central nervous system, Fluids and Barriers of the CNS, October 3, 2022, Read More

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