Anthal Smits

Anthal Smits is Assistant Professor of ImmunoRegeneration at the Department of Biomedical Engineeering (section Soft Tissue Engineering & Mechanobiology) and the Insitute for Complex Molecular Systems at Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, The Netherlands. He leads the ImmunoRegeneration Group, which specializes in immunomodulation to induce in situ tissue regeneration. The main research goal is to gain a mechanistic understanding of the interactions between human immune cell behavior, biomaterial design, and biomechanical loads, in conditions of health and disease. Smits’ main clinical target applications are cardiovascular replacements (e.g. heart valves and blood vessels), yet, the research is curiosity-driven, and applicable to a wide variety of clinical applications.

Smits' research has an interdisciplinary nature, bridging the fields of tissue engineering, mechanobiology, materials science, and immunology. Topics of investigation range from the fundamentals of patient-specific macrophage-biomaterial interactions using dynamic in vitro platforms, to the development of regenerative scaffolds for heart valve and blood vessel tissue engineering.

The body's immune system is an incredibly versatile entity, equally capable of tissue destruction and construction. The potential of harnessing this duality for tissue regeneration is tremendously fascinating and challenging.”