PhD Jan Wouter Drijfhout

Research interests

I am interested in structure-activity relationships of synthetic peptides in order to develop peptide-based therapeutics or diagnostics for various diseases. Profiting from the fact that the large number of available amino acids enables easy access to millions of peptide structures, my group has been involved in many collaborative research projects. Examples of research topics over the years are epitope identification and/or vaccine peptide synthesis in coeliac disease, diabetes and cancer, peptide-HLA binding studies, synthetic peptides to treat otitis media, the development of antimicrobial peptides against various (multidrug resistant) bacterial strains, peptides with anti-viral or anti-fungal activity and for early diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis. Some of the projects rely on peptide library technology (synthesis and screening of arrays of millions of peptides), which we developed in house for the identification of new peptides.

In addition, I am interested in making modified peptides as basic research tools. We have developed protocols for peptide modification with- detection and/or identification tags (such as fluorescent groups, colours, spin labels and stable isotope labelled amino acids), FRET-peptides, peptides carrying affinity tags (such as biotin or metal-chelating groups), circular peptides, all-D peptides, retro-inverso peptides, lipo-peptides etc. (see also the link to research facilities).

Curriculum Vitae

I studied Organic Chemistry and Environmental Sciences at the University of Groningen. I obtained my PhD at the University of Leiden with Prof. dr. J.H. van Boom in 1989 (development of a synthetic peptide vaccine against herpes simplex virus infections). Subsequently, I did a two-year post-doctoral period at the Research Institute of the Marion Merrell Dow company in Strasbourg, France (structure-activity studies of synthetic peptides in the area of hypertension and HIV within the group of Dr. J.T. Pelton).

In 1991, I was allowed to set-up a peptide-synthesis facility at the LUMC within this department to perform and support peptide-related medical research. In 1998, I co-founded the GMP peptide facility (the current IGFL) to allow for in-house production of synthetic peptides to be applied in clinical investigations in humans. I have been QC manager for the IGFL, referee for several scientific journals, reviewer for various grant programmes of NWO and TTW). Co-author on over 300 scientific publications, about 17,000 citations, h-index 73. Co-inventor on about 25 patent applications