VIB Blog's pressreleases

From cancer cells to climate-resilient trees: how CRISPR is transforming research at VIB From decoding gene function to tackling cancer and building a sustainable future, VIB researchers are using CRISPR to push the boundaries of life science. A cancer cell escaping therapy. A yeast cell revealing the secrets of gene regulation. A poplar tree engineered without introducing foreign DNA. At first g…

Building trust in biotechnology starts with listening Biotechnology can only create real societal impact if the people it aims to serve are part of the journey. Laurien Van Dyck reflects on how the Horizon Europe B-Trust project is helping researchers build trust through co-creation. Among other things, biotechnology is helping to create more sustainable food systems, reduce the use of chemicals …

Why art-science initiatives are suddenly everywhere and why they matter more than ever Art-science collaborations are no longer niche experiments on the fringes of academia; in 2026, they have become one of the most dynamic, evidence-backed movements reshaping how we understand health, society, and scientific innovation. Their impact is visible not only in major research breakthroughs but in the …

Rethinking sarcoma diagnosis: how COMPASS puts patients at the center A VIB Grand Challenges project unites scientists, clinicians, and patients to transform how rare cancers are diagnosed Sarcomas are rare cancers that develop in bone and soft tissues, from muscle and fat to connective tissue. They are not one disease, but more than a hundred different subtypes, each with its own characteristics…

“Startups are often surprised by what we do” Bram Van den Bergh on the unique value the Tech Watch Core brings when scouting, testing, and smoothing the path for breakthrough tools “As a PhD student, whenever I could play around with new tech for my experiments, I was happy,” says Bram Van den Bergh, technology expert at VIB’s Tech Watch Core. His tech curiosity is now an integral part of the job…

Summer is the season for learning Summer has decidedly arrived. It is the season of heat waves, world cup fever, and… summer schools! At VIB Technologies, we’ve already had three this season: one on Computational Cytometry, one on Light Microscopy, and one on Spatial Omics. Different technologies, different audiences, different workflows, but all with the same goal: giving researchers the time, c…

From alcohol-free beer to sustainable biofuels and chemicals: how the Verstrepen lab turns yeast science into impact From brewing and bioethanol to future biomaterials, yeast expertise developed at VIB and KU Leuven shows how fundamental research, industrial partnerships, and a strong innovation ecosystem can translate science into real-world impact. Can yeast be redesigned to produce beer with l…

How microbiome research is moving from discovery to impact What if the key to understanding diseases like cancer, Parkinson’s, or even depression lies not just in our own cells, but in the trillions of microbes that live within and around us? On World Microbiome Day, let’s look at how the microbiome has rapidly grown into one of the most exciting frontiers in life sciences. As scientists, includi…

The shock absorbers of biology Kevin Verstrepen and his team on buffer proteins and the genetic variation they mask A recent Nature news feature dives into how buffer proteins can protect us from harmful mutations and how that could inspire new drugs. We asked Kevin Verstrepen, as one of the experts quoted in the piece, and team members Mo Tawfeeq, Karin Voordeckers, Hala Kasmo, and Iris Goeminne…

A high-throughput orchestra of robots and readers The automation engine driving reliable data at the VIB Screening Core The VIB Screening Core operates an intricately linked platform of advanced technologies designed to execute complex screens in a high-throughput, low-variability manner. However, beneath the swinging robotic arms and high-content microscopes lies a broader capability obscured by…

"Plant science will play a central role in addressing some of the major challenges facing society" A conversation with Julia Santiago Cuellar on the frontiers of plant science in the runup to the fourth edition of the conference 'At the forefront of plant research' Understanding and harnessing plant life is essential to human civilization. Plants not only feed a growing global population and supp…

Algorithms and biological data - meet Dmitry Kobak Following a PhD in bioengineering from Imperial College London and a postdoc at the Champalimaud Centre in Lisbon, Dmitry Kobak set up his own group at the Hertie AI Institute at Tübingen University. In 2026, he moved to the VIB Center for AI & Computational Biology. Time to ask him some questions. Hi, Dmitry, and welcome to VIB! Can you briefly …

On World Ocean Day, we celebrate the power of marine microbes The ocean is one of Earth's biggest allies in buffering climate change. But some of its most important work happens out of sight, at the scale of molecules and microbes. At the VIB-KU Leuven Center for Microbiology, Sammy Pontrelli and his team study how marine microbes control the fate of carbon in the ocean, and what that might teach…

Measuring how proteins interact in their natural habitat A deep dive into FLIM-FRET and the QF Pro® workflow Modern cell biology is full of interaction maps. We can pull down complexes, run mass spectrometry, and build networks that suggest who touches whom. But those approaches often share the same blind spot: they turn tissue into a homogenate. You learn that an interaction exists somewhere in …

An EPIC research trip to Stockholm Eva Van Bun, PhD student in the Verstrepen lab, recently spent four weeks at the lab of Vicente Pelechano at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, to learn advanced methods for polysome profiling and RNA-sequencing. It was an intense month with long lab days, intense scientific exchange, new collaborations, and memorable Swedish traditions, all of whic…

Subtyping a complex dementia A high-resolution view of frontotemporal dementia and TDP-43 accumulation In nineteenth-century biology, few debates ran hotter than the one between “lumpers” and “splitters”. Lumpers preferred to group organisms into broad categories while splitters preferred to carve out ever more precise distinctions. As a consequence, botanists couldn't even agree on how many spec…

"Jump in, engage, and enjoy the ride!" A conversation with expert Evelien Van Hamme on what it takes to understand the spatial dimension of life sciences Spatial omics is a rapidly growing field that enables researchers to study spatial patterns of gene and protein expression within tissues. By revealing how cells interact in their native environment, these technologies help map disease progressi…

Instant structure visualization with Mol* Viewer Modern structural workflows are no longer confined to a single desktop or a single file. Models are generated in pipelines, shared across teams, and revisited as new evidence comes in. Yet for many researchers, “visualizing a structure” still means downloading files to a laptop, moving data between systems, or launching a remote desktop session. If…

Science beyond institutes: Citizen science at VIB At VIB, we strive to translate our fundamental science into tangible benefits for society. One of the ways in which we do so, is by involving citizens. More than measurement First coined in the 1989 January issue of MIT Technology Review, citizen science has become a growing and important part of the scientific enterprise. While exact definitions …

From live action to the molecular backstory of single cells Tech Watch scouts the wave of new platforms targeting live single-cell characterization Single-cell biology has long forced researchers into an uncomfortable trade-off: watch what a cell does, or find out what it expresses, but rarely both on the same cell. Most tools capture static snapshots of inherently dynamic processes, leaving a ga…