Congratulations to Pieter Louwe on passing his PhD viva

Tissue Repair student Pieter Louwe passes PhD viva voce

Many congratulations to Pieter on this significant achievement.

Pieter carried out his research in the lab of Dr Steve Jenkins at the MRC Centre for Inflammation Research. Pieter used a novel adoptive transfer system to investigate the capacity of inflammatory macrophages recruited during the early stages of peritonitis to contribute to the macrophage compartment post inflammation. His findings indicate that inflammatory macrophages persist long-term after the initiation of inflammation, but despite adapting a resident macrophage phenotype, they remain transcriptionally distinct. 

Pieter has established markers to identify inflammatory macrophages and using these markers was able to purify resident and inflammatory macrophages 8 weeks after inflammation. His preliminary data indicate that in vitro these inflammatory macrophages produce less cytokines in response to LPS stimulation. 

During his studies, Pieter has contributed to several papers, including a first author paper that is in press.

Rate of replenishment and microenvironment contribute to the sexually dimorphic phenotype and function of peritoneal macrophages. Bain CC et al (2020)

Csf1r-mApple Transgene Expression and Ligand Binding In Vivo Reveal Dynamics of CSF1R Expression within the Mononuclear Phagocyte System. Hawley CA et al (2018)