Our research aims at preventing cancer development and progression by increasing our understanding of the gut microbiome and how it keeps us healthy as well as the underlying mechanisms for its role in cancer development.

My team has spent the past years collecting longitudinal mucosal biopsy samples of patients with a high-risk for colorectal cancer, including Lynch syndrome and Ulcerative colitis patients, to unravel host-microbe relationships that lead to early carcinogenesis. We have developed techniques to study the mucosal microbiome in detail both in vitro and in patient samples.

Our current projects focus on using bacterial biofilms, a plaque of bacteria on the gut epithelial surface, as potential diagnostic tool to visualize high-risk cancer precursor lesions as well as understanding the role of the gut microbiome in metastastic spread of tumour cells. Next to colon cancer, we are investigating the local breast microbiome and its potential role in treatment outcomes for estrogen-positive breast cancer.