J.l. (johannes L. (hans)) Bos

Biography

Since his PhD in the lab of Piet Borst (1980), Hans Bos has devoted his research to understand the molecular cause of cancer. Initially in the lab of Alex van der Eb in Leiden, using adenovirus 12, a virus that can form tumors in rodents. In 1984 he started to work on Ras mutations in human tumors. He could demonstrate that such mutations occur frequently in many tumor types. At that time this knowledge had little clinical relevance, but now 30 years later the impact is clear: current targeted therapies almost all fail once the tumor has such a mutation. After a sabbatical year in San Francisco with Frank McCormick he moved to Utrecht in 1991 to become professor in Molecular Cancer Research and to work on the function of the Ras protein. In 1994 he started to work on a Ras-related protein, Rap, as this protein was found to inhibit the effect of mutant Ras. More recently, he joined forces with Hans Clevers, to study Ras in patient-derived tumor organoids. Hans Bos is chairperson of the UMCU priority program Cancer, chairperson of the UMCU Center for Molecular Medicine, and head of the Department Molecular Cancer Research. Since his PhD in the lab of Piet Borst (1980), Hans Bos has devoted his research to understand the molecular cause of cancer. Initially in the lab of Alex van der Eb in Leiden, using adenovirus 12, a virus that can form tumors in rodents. In 1984 he started to work on Ras mutations in human tumors. He could demonstrate that such mutations occur frequently in many tumor types. At that time this knowledge had little clinical relevance, but now 30 years later the impact is clear: current targeted therapies almost all fail once the tumor has such a mutation. After a sabbatical year in San Francisco with Frank McCormick he moved to Utrecht in 1991 to become professor in Molecular Cancer Research and to work on the function of the Ras protein. In 1994 he started to work on a Ras-related protein, Rap, as this protein was found to inhibit the effect of mutant Ras. More recently, he joined forces with Hans Clevers, to study Ras in patient-derived tumor organoids. Hans Bos is chairperson of the UMCU priority program Cancer, chairperson of the UMCU Center for Molecular Medicine, and head of the Department Molecular Cancer Research.

Research Interest

Molecular Cancer