UT scientist Erik Groot Jebbink wants to use microbubbles for improving the treatment of liver cancer. Pre-injecting microbubbles to see their route towards the tumor could be key to improve the precision of delivering injected cell-killing radioactive particles at the tumor site.
This idea has been awarded a VENI scholarship in the NWO talent scheme Veni, Vidi, Vici. Groot Jebbink was one of the 25 young scientists, less than 10 percent of all applicants within the ZonMW domain, receiving 250.000 euro for a three-year research program.
Erik Groot Jebbink can rightly be called a blood flow expert. For several years he has been using tiny gas bubbles, coated with a thin lipid layer for stabilization, to quantify local blood flow phenomena to improve the treatment of vascular diseases. Since a blood flow profile is closely related to potential vascular problems, this technique has resulted in an effective identification of problem areas and risk zones inside blood vessels, and potentially more effective long-term treatment of vascular diseases.