The immune system protects against disease, yet its dysregulation drives conditions ranging from cardiovascular disease to cancer. Every immune cell arises in the bone marrow, the 'factory' that makes billions of blood cells each day. This thesis presents two advances. First, the thigh bone, the standard site researchers study, proves unrepresentative: different bones across the body respond very differently to disease, with the skull and sternum as striking outliers. Second, we delivered tiny nanoparticle drugs straight to the spleen and bone marrow, exactly where new immune cells form. In animal models, this approach restored an exhausted immune system after life-threatening infection (sepsis) and slowed tumour growth, with fewer side effects than existing therapies. Measurements in non-human primates and in patient cells confirm its relevance for humans. Rather than treating symptoms, this strategy acts at the very source of disease.
Jeroen Deckers (Almere, 1997) studied Biomedical Engineering at Eindhoven University of Technology, specializing in protein engineering. After an externship at Mount Sinai in New York, he carried out his doctoral research in Willem Mulder's group at the Department of Internal Medicine of Radboud university medical center. He remains affiliated with this lab, studying ovarian cancer and sepsis.