About me:

I'm a BBSRC Future Leader Fellow in the Department of Biosciences. I have a broad interest in host-parasite interactions, and I have worked on various different model systems to tackle questions that are broadly related to how parasites manipulate their hosts (from behaviour to immune responses), and how hosts counteracts these processes. For my PhD I have worked on behavioural manipulation of insects by baculoviruses, while for my postdoc I have shifted to bacteria and their viruses (phages) as a model system for host-parasite interactions. Among other things, I have studied if, how and when bacteria use an adaptive immune response (CRISPR-Cas) to defend themselves against phages. More recently I have studied how phages manage to counteract the CRISPR-Cas immune response in bacterial hosts. My lab currently focuses on how we can use CRISPR-Cas systems to alter microbial communities, with a particular focus on removing antimicrobial resistance genes from these communities, a project which is funded by the BBSRC. You can find more information about my research group at my personal website: https://vanhoutelab.wordpress.com.

2014: PhD Wageningen University

2006: MSc Molecular Sciences Wageningen University

2004: BSc Molecular Sciences Wageningen University

2018 - 2020: BBSRC Future Leader Fellow, Biosciences, University of Exeter

2016 - 2017: Marie Sklodowska Curie Research Fellow, Biosciences, University of Exeter

2014 - 2015: postdoctoral researcher, Biosciences, University of Exeter

2009 - 2013: PhD virology, defended on 21 January 2014, Wageningen University, the Netherlands

2007 - 2008: junior researcher, University of Bologna, Italy

2001 - 2006: Bachelor and Master degree in Molecular Sciences, Wageningen University, the Netherlands