Research expertise

Koen Bartholomeeusen graduated as a Master in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Antwerp (UA) in 2003. He went on to perform doctoral studies at the Catholic University of Leuven (KULeuven) obtaining the degree of Doctor in Medical Sciences in 2009. During this period Koen studied host cell factors contributing to HIV-1 replication in the lab of Prof. Debyser. At the time already HIV-1 disease had, from a therapeutic standpoint, become a chronic ailment due to the ready availability of potent antivirals and curing patient would require removing residually infected cells from the body. One aspect towards this goal is the reactivation of transcriptionally silent virus to allow re-exposure of infected cells to the immune system. Focusing on these themes, as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) in the lab of Prof. Peterlin (2010-2014), Koen studied basic molecular aspects of HIV-1 transcriptional control and the potential of small molecule drugs to reverse the silenced transcriptional activity of the latent HIV-1 provirus. Returning to Europe, Koen joined the lab of Prof. Blazek at the Central European Institute of Technology (CEITEC) in Czech Republic (2014-2015) to continue some of the studies into basic transcriptional processes before joining the lab of Prof. Ariën at the Institute of Tropical Medicine (ITM) in Antwerp (2015-..). As a senior researcher in the Virology Unit at ITM Koen studies the molecular aspects of virus-host interactions of arboviruses and their replication in human and mosquito. His research includes determination of viral genetic characteristics governing vector/host specific interactions and the virus-host protein interactome of arboviruses with the emphasis on innate immune and basic cellular biological aspects of viral replication in both organisms with the ultimate goal of understanding and preventing the pathologies and suppressing viral replication in light of the limited therapeutic options available today.