Head of Department of Human Genetics (LUMC, the Netherlands)
Leiden University Medical Center – LUMC
Email - Silvère
Prof. Dr. Ir. Silvère van der Maarel was trained as a Human Geneticist at the Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centerin the Netherlands. He continued to work on the positional cloning of X-linked disease genes at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Biology in Berlin,Germany. In 1997, Silvère van der Maarel joined the Department of Human Genetics in Leiden(LUMC, the Netherlands). In 2006, he was appointed Professor of Medical Epigenetics and from 2012 he is chairing the Department of Human Genetics at the LUMC.
Prof. van der Maarel’s scientific interests focus on the genetic and epigenetic regulation of repetitive DNA in the human genome in relation to disease. His main interest is the genetic and epigenetic basis of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD), an adult muscle disease caused by genetic and epigenetic changes in a repetitive DNA structure on the tip of the long arm of chromosome 4. He also made contributions to other muscular dystrophies including OPMD and LGMD.