Hans Aerts

Hans Aerts chairs the Dep. Medical Biochemistry at Leiden University and earlier at the AMC-Amsterdam (2000-2014). His research focuses on glycosphingolipids in health and disease with special attention for inherited lysosomal storage disorders like Gaucher disease, as well as neurodegeneration and the Metabolic Syndrome.

Trained in biochemistry at the University of Amsterdam and the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, USA), he completed his PhD thesis Biochemical studies on glucocerebrosidase in relation to Gaucher disease with honours in 1988. He was involved in the first applications of enzyme replacement therapy and substrate reduction therapy of type 1 Gaucher disease as well as the discovery of now widely used biomarkers. He developed small compounds to visualize and inhibit the cellular β-glucosidases (GBA1 and GBA2), with potential therapeutic and diagnostic applications.

He has been (co)promotor of 49 completed PhD theses and published >450 peer-reviewed papers (H-index: 99, Google Scholar). He is recipient of governmental research grants, e.g., the ERC Advanced Research Grant ‘Chemical Biology of Sphingolipids, NWO Building Blocks of Life Grant ‘Glucosylceramide’ and co-recipient of the recent EU grant Recon4IMD.

He is co-founder and honorary president of the European Working Group on Gaucher Disease, present IWGGD, that comprises Gaucher clinical and research centres and national patient societies worldwide.