Cathelijne van den Berg

Cathelijne van den Berg is currently appointed as Assistant Professor in the Nephrology department at the Leiden University Medical Center, the Netherlands.

She performed her PhD in the laboratory of Prof. Christine Mummery investigating the use of pluripotent stem cells in cardiac differentiation, development and disease.

She next joined the group of Prof. Ton Rabelink in the department of Nephrology focusing on the generation of kidney organoids from human induced pluripotent stem cells. These cells can be differentiated to kidney organoids that contain glomerular and tubular structures. The utility and suitability of these renal structures for regenerative medicine relies on their functionality. We have demonstrated that transplantation of these kidney organoids is important for their vascularization that subsequently leads to maturation and filtration in the glomeruli. This is an important step forward for clinical translation and shows their therapeutic potential in stem cell medicine.
Our long-term goal is to cure patients with kidney disease and we focus on future clinical application of these kidney organoids as auxiliary tissue in patients.

We are part of a unique ecosystem for regenerative medicine in Leiden with the Netherlands Center for the Clinical Advancement of Stem Cell & Gene Therapies (NecstGen) nearby and participate in the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Stem Cell Medicine reNEW and Regenerative Medicine Crossing Borders (RegMedXB) to develop a clinical application for patients with kidney failure.