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Researcher

Geert Mortier

  • Research Expertise  (University of Antwerp):The research activities are mainly situated in the field of human genomics. The mission of our research is to increase the knowledge of the molecular basis and disease mechanisms causing genetic disorders of the skeleton (skeletal dysplasias). With our research we aim to provide new insights in the biology of normal skeletal development, improve genetic diagnosis and counselling for the patients and enable the development of new therapeutic strategies for this group of rare and chronic disorders. Since many of these disorders are characterized by (disproportionate) short stature and/or degenerative joint disease, our research also contributes to the better understanding of more common disorders in the population such as osteoarthrosis in adulthood and growth disorders in childhood. The major goals of our research are i) to identify genes that are important in the regulation of linear growth, endochondral ossification, bone homeostasis and maintenance of cartilage integrity, ii) to explore the phenotypic consequences of mutations in these genes, iii) to gain more insights in the pathophysiology and genotype-phenotype correlations of these disorders and iv) to develop new therapeutic possibilities for this group of disorders
  • Keywords  (University of Antwerp):GROWTH REGULATION, SKELETAL DISORDERS, CARTILAGE, MOLECULAR GENETICS, Medicine
  • Disciplines  (KU Leuven):Genetics, Medical genomics
  • Disciplines  (University of Antwerp):Analysis of next-generation sequence data, Clinical genetics and molecular diagnostics, Genetics
  • Research techniques  (University of Antwerp):next generation sequencing, array based techniques, animal models, iPSCs, functional assays, bioinformatics
  • Users of research expertise  (University of Antwerp):Stakeholders are patients, academic researchers, health care providers, industry and health care policy makers