Microbial Stress & Food Safety Group
PI: Prof. Dr. Stanley Brul
Fundamental and applied microbiology to understand stress physiology, antibiotic action and resistance emergence.
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Research groups
Research areas and groups
The Microbiology theme consists of multiple research groups organised into research areas, covering microbial food safety and microbiomes, bacterial physiology and cell biology, microbiome engineering and biomolecular mass spectrometry.
Molecular Biology and Microbial Food Safety (MBMFS)
Cluster led by Prof. Stanley Brul focusing on microbial food safety and microbiomes across hosts, industrial systems and environments, integrating molecular biology with risk assessment and regulation.
Spatial SysBio Lab
PI: Dr. Marten Postma
Spatial systems biology studying signal transduction and cell polarity regulation in microbial systems.
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EvoSysBio Lab
PI: Dr. Meike Wortel
Studying how microbial populations adapt and allocate resources, and how constraints shape growth, fitness and coexistence.
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Gumi Lab
PI: Dr. Jianbo Zhang
Developing experimental systems to probe microbiome interactions with epithelial tissues and immune players.
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Bacterial Cell Biology and Physiology (BCBP)
Cluster led by Prof. Leendert Hamoen that studies bacterial physiology, chromosome organisation and gene regulation, from fundamental mechanisms to infection biology and antimicrobial resistance.
Molecular Microbial Physiology Group
PI: Dr. Filipe Branco dos Santos
Quantitative microbial physiology and biotechnology, using systems and synthetic biology for strain development.
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DNA & RNA Interaction Lab
PI: Dr. Gaurav Dugar
RNA-centric microbiology, mapping DNA–RNA–protein interaction networks and non-canonical regulation in bacteria.
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Bacterial Cell Biology
PI: Prof. Dr. Leendert W. Hamoen
Fundamental bacterial cell biology and chromosome dynamics underpinning growth, stress responses and pathogenesis.
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Microbiome Engineering (ME)
Cluster led by Prof. Sahar El Aidy focusing on human and industrial microbiomes, engineering microbial communities and leveraging microbiome insights for health and biotechnology applications.
Microbiome Engineering Lab
PI: Prof. Dr. Sahar El Aidy
Human and industrial microbiome research and engineering, targeting health, food and biotechnology applications.
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Endowed Chairs
Endowed chairs that support food safety, industrial biotechnology, and microbiome research across all microbiology research pillars.
Peribiome Lab
PI: Prof. Dr. Ghislain R.L.J. Schyns
Peripheral microbiomes interactions with gut microbiomes and host, studying peribiome axes and their networks.
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Microbial Food Safety Chair
PI: Prof. Dr. Ir. Linda Verhoef
Endowed chair connecting microbial food safety research with regulatory practice and national policy.
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Mass Spectrometry Core Facility
State-of-the-art research infrastructure and expertise in mass spectrometry for proteomics, metabolomics, lipidomics and other advanced analytical techniques to support microbiology research across all themes.
Mass Spectrometry of Biomolecules
PI: Dr. Gertjan Kramer
Institute-wide mass spectrometry core, supporting microbial omics and quantitative biomolecular analysis.
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