Dr. Maria Yazdanbakhsh heads the Leiden University Center for Infectious Diseases (LUCID) in the Netherlands. LUCID engages in basic and clinical research to understand host-pathogen interactions at the molecular, cellular and population level. The knowledge gained is being applied to contribute to vaccine development and to the identification of immune modulatory pathways to control excessive inflammation.
Maria has won, among others, the NWO Spinoza Prize, which is the highest award in Dutch academia for researchers that do outstanding and groundbreaking research with broad effect. Her research is characterized by strong partnerships with researchers from low and middle income countries, generating large amounts of data on the variation in the immune system and how it might impact vaccine responses.
Maria has visiting professorships at University of Indonesia, at Hasanuddin University in Indonesia, and at Centre de Recherches Médicales de Lambaréné, Gabon. She is the Chair of Internationalisation Committee of LUMC (LUMC Global), initiator of Hypovax Global (hypovax.org), and has served on the Advisory Board of Indonesian Medical Education and Research Institute, Wellcome Trust Immune System in Health and Disease Discovery Group, the Dutch Research Council for development.
Maria Yazdanbakhsh is elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KMAW), the Royal Holland Society of Sciences and Humanities (KHMW), Academia Europaea, and European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO).