Royal DSM takes a lab tour on synthetic cell research

On July  4, a delegation from Royal DSM, a Dutch multinational corporation active in the fields of health, nutrition and bioscience, visited the campus of Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands (TU Delft). During the visit to the Bionanoscience Department, they participated in a lab tour led by the talented researchers of BaSyC and the European Synthetic Cell Initiative (SynCellEU).

Professor Gijsje Koenderink said: “At SynCellEU, we believe that collaboration and ongoing dialogue with companies are essential to bridge the gap between synthetic cell research and technology and to accelerate the development of applications.

“DSM has been following our pioneering research for the development of synthetic cell-based technologies since the beginning. So we were delighted yesterday to welcome a company with which we have such strong connections.”

First, the DSM delegation was introduced to the long-term vision of the SynCellEU initiative, some of the milestones of BaSyC and SynCellEU, and the cutting-edge research on synthetic cells conducted by BaSyC researchers.

This was followed by a tour of the labs where Dr. Ilina Bareja, Dr. Lennard van Buren, and PhD students Roman Barth and Sabrina Meindlhumer, offered a more in-depth look at different approaches to understanding how cells work and mimic their natural processes.