This thesis describes a series of studies about patients with pharmacoresistant epilepsy caused by a malformation of cortical development called ‘Focal Cortical Dysplasia (FCD)’, who are evaluated for epilepsy surgery. ...

Even with the greatly improved treatment options, cardiovascular disease is still an important cause of death and causes a huge disease burden worldwide. Many patients survive their first atherosclerotic disease manifestation ...

Patients with acquired brain injury (ABI) often experience cognitive impairment, such as forgetfulness or difficulties concentrating. Cognitive impairment can be one of the most devastating consequences of a brain injury, ...

Development and speciation are directed by changes in gene expression programs, which are in turn controlled by regulatory elements such as enhancers, that act in a cell-type and temporal-specific manner. Recent whole ...

Ageing of the immune system leads to impaired immune responses in older individuals. Latent infection with cytomegalovirus (CMV) is thought to accelerate ageing of the immune system. CMV is a common herpes virus that ...

"Patients in rare diseases should be entitled to the same quality of treatment as other patients". The recent implementation of international and national strategy plans for rare diseases has led to an incredible increase ...

Over the last two decades, urotherapy has become the mainstay treatment of bladder and bowel problems in children and adolescents. Urotherapy uses non-pharmacological, non-surgical methods and focuses on behavioral ...

Although the prognosis of patients with esophageal cancer has improved over the past decades, treatment still has a detrimental impact on a patients’ quality of life. The treatment of locally advanced esophageal cancer is ...

The immune system is essential for the maintenance of the body and in this function inflammation is a powerful tool. Since underperformance as well as excessive inflammation are a serious threat to physical health a strict ...

The main objectives of the research presented in this thesis are to develop a representative in vitro model of human aortic valve disease, and to engineer a drug delivery platform to deliver non-coding RNA over an extended ...