Cancer, immunotherapy development, high resolution 3D imaging, organoid technology, bio-engineering
Our Focus
The Rios group develops new human-centric experimental model systems and tailored microscopy technologies to advance cancer research and find new leads for therapy improvement. A key focus lies on understanding the dynamic mode-of-action of cellular immunotherapy, a promising class of treatment that harvests the patient’s own immune system to fight cancer. These cellular therapies essentially are ‘living drugs’ and we argue that to exploit their full clinical potential we need to better understand their living mode-of-action. To achieve this, we developed a live cell imaging platform (BEHAV3D) designed to record the functional behavior of these cells. In addition, we invest in the development of human model systems that not only capture the diverse tumor characteristics and varying treatment responses as observed in patients, but that we also try to further advance by adding key components of the tumor microenvironment. The direct environment of the tumor, and especially local immune cells, are known to significantly impact treatment outcomes. With these advanced models we try to map these often detrimental interactions between the local immune cells, the tumor cells and the cells used to treat cancer. Through these efforts we aim to find new therapeutic targets to maximize treatment outcomes.
About Anne Rios
My Research
‘Visualize the unexpected’ is the driving force behind my science.
From the start of her scientific career, Anne developed an intense passion for imaging, which she applied during her PhD in developmental biology to unveil a novel developmental scenario by which migrating cells from adjacent tissues can trigger cell fate changes in muscle stem-cells (Nature, 2011). During her postdoc, she established a method to visualize intact tissue using 3D microscopic reconstruction (Neil Lawrence prize for most creative young scientist, 2016). The power of this method in driving scientific discovery is illustrated by the first in vivo evidence for bipotent stem cells in the mammary gland (Nature, 2014, Nature cell biology, 2017) and the unexpected finding of polyploid cells during lactation (Nature Communications, 2016). Moreover, it was optimized into a rapid and easy-to-use protocol for 3D imaging of entire organs, intact tumours and organoids (Cancer Cell, 2019 -highlighted Best of Cancer Cell 2019; Nature Biotechnology 2021; Nature Protocols 2019 & Nature Protocols, 2022). Combined with a novel multicolored single-cell 3D intravital imaging technique, this technique allowed for discovering a novel population of resident macrophages essential for maintaining breast homeostasis, as well as involved in breast cancer progression (Nature Cell Biology, 2020, Nature Protocols, 2021).
In 2017, Anne was recruited as a group leader to the Princess Máxima Center for Pediatric Oncology and head of the Princess Máxima Imaging Center. In 2019, she was also appointed Oncode junior principal investigator. She built a multidisciplinary team, with experts in bioengineering, imaging and computational science and together they study cancer biology and immunotherapy treatment response. Anne is a selected next generation member of the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR), a program committee member of the European Fight Kid Cancer funding agency and a founding member of the EMBO journal catalyst program. Anne received a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant and KWF high risk grant for her work on pediatric brain cancer, a CGC Young PI Award to study breast cancer dynamics and a St. Baldrick’s Robert J. Arceci Innovation Award recognizing her innovative approaches to tackle paediatric cancer research. In addition, Anne is a participating PI in multiple consortia dedicated to the next generation of T cell therapies, advancing organoid technology and further developing imaging and analytical frameworks to study and guide cells in their native environment. In 2021, she received the L’Oréal-UNESCO for Woman in Science Award and is now one of the founders of ACE (Authenticity in science for Community and Excellence) to promote women in science. In 2021, she was a honorary Fellow of NIAS-KNAW (Dutch royal Academy of Arts and Sciences) for 5 months, where she developed projects related to Art and Science. She has a strong passion for engaging the public (NWO Science Communication grant, 2002) and inspiring the future generation of scientists, which she aims to achieve through unique immersive displays of her group’s 3D imaging data.
Awards
- 2025: NWO Vici Grant – Directing CAR T cell behaviour towards enhanced performance against diffuse midline glioma
- 2025: NWO Open Competition Domain Science M2 Grant – Dissecting T cell serial killing of solid tumours
- 2024: Charlie Teo Foundation Research Rebel Grant – Dynamic recalibration of engineered T cells for precise targeting of diffuse midline glioma
- 2024: NWO Venture Challenge – Sniper Therapeutics
- 2023: KiKa Research Grant – Advancing T cell therapies for diffuse midline glioma using a 3D imaging-transcriptomics platform
- 2022: NWO Science Communication Grant – An unexpected alliance to portray cancer
- 2022: Horizon Europe Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) COFUND, Co-Principal Investigator – From Caterpillar to BUTTERFLY: supporting transformation of DCs in a paediatric oncology network
- 2022: NWO Gravitation Grant, IMAGINE! Consortium – Innovative Microscopy and Guidance of Cells in Their Native Environment
- 2022: Roche Access to Distinguished Scientists (ROADS) Programme – High definition of T-cell therapy response and underlying resistance mechanisms using BEHAV3D for accelerating precision medicine
- 2021: L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Award
- 2021: Industrial Partnership with FrieslandCampina – In vitro system for studying biological and nutritional factors affecting lactation and the function of human milk on intestinal development and physiology
- 2021: ODAS Foundation Consortium Grant – Identify targets to modulate CAR-T cell functionality using advanced 3D co-culture and imaging technologies: Towards better survival of paediatric BCP-ALL patients
- 2021: Dutch Cancer Society (KWF) Consortium Grant – Targeting human cancer with the next generation of engineered immune cells: TEGs
- 2019: St. Baldrick's Foundation Robert J. Arceci International Innovation Award – 3D imaging innovation: a fresh eye on paediatric cancer
- 2018: European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant – Deciphering and targeting the invasive nature of Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma
- 2018: Dutch Cancer Society (KWF) High-Risk Grant – Unravelling the integration of paediatric high-grade glioma in the developing brain using state-of-the-art imaging
- 2018: Villa Joep Grant – Optimising neuroblastoma resection using fluorescence-guided surgery
- 2018: Cancer Genomics Centre (CGC) Young PI Award – Studying human breast cancer dynamics using multicoloured lineage tracing
- 2017: Member of the Cancer Genomics Centre
- 2016: Lawrence Creative Prize, Medical Innovation Award
- 2014: Walter and Eliza Hall Institute Postdoctoral Award
- 2013: Postdoctoral Fellowship, co-funded by the National Breast Cancer Foundation and Cure Cancer Australia Foundation
- 2011: Director's Prize PhD Award
Key Publications
- 2026 | De novo H3.3K27M-altered Diffuse Midline Glioma in human brainstem organoids to dissect GD2 CAR T cell function | Nils Bessler et al. | Nature Cancer | View publication
- 2026 | IGSF11-VISTA is a critical and targetable immune checkpoint axis in Diffuse Midline Glioma | Raphaël Collot et al. | Cancer Cell | View publication
- 2025 | Mapping T cell dynamics to molecular profiles through Behavior-Guided Transcriptomics | A. K. L. Wezenaar et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2024 | BEHAV3D: a 3D live imaging platform for comprehensive analysis of engineered T cell behavior and tumor response | Maria Alieva et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2023 | Bridging live-cell imaging and next-generation cancer treatment | Maria Alieva et al. | Nature Reviews Cancer | View publication
- 2022 | Multispectral confocal 3D imaging of intact healthy and tumor tissue using mLSR-3D | Ravian L. van Ineveld et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2022 | Resolving the spatial heterogeneity of cancer in 3D | A. C. Rios | Nature Reviews Cancer | View publication
- 2022 | Uncovering the mode of action of engineered T cells in patient cancer organoids | Johanna F. Dekkers et al. | Nature Biotechnology | View publication
- 2022 | 3D imaging for driving cancer discovery | Ravian L. van Ineveld et al. | The EMBO Journal | View publication
- 2021 | Long-term culture, genetic manipulation and xenotransplantation of human normal and breast cancer organoids | Johanna F. Dekkers et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2021 | Revealing the spatio-phenotypic patterning of cells in healthy and tumor tissues with mLSR-3D and STAPL-3D | Ravian L. van Ineveld et al. | Nature Biotechnology | View publication
- 2021 | Intravital microscopy of dynamic single-cell behaviour in mouse mammary tissue | Caleb A. Dawson et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2020 | Anti-GD2-IRDye800CW as a targeted probe for fluorescence-guided surgery in neuroblastoma | L. W. Wellens et al. | Scientific Reports | View publication
- 2020 | Tissue-resident ductal macrophages survey the mammary epithelium and facilitate tissue remodelling | Caleb A. Dawson et al. | Nature Cell Biology | View publication
- 2019 | High-resolution three-dimensional imaging of fixed and cleared organoids | Johanna F. Dekkers et al. | Nature Protocols | View publication
- 2019 | Intraclonal plasticity in mammary tumors revealed through large-scale single-cell resolution 3D imaging | A. C. Rios et al. | Cancer Cell | View publication
- 2018 | Imaging organoids: a bright future ahead | A. C. Rios et al. | Nature Methods | View publication
- 2014 | In situ identification of bipotent stem cells in the mammary gland | A. C. Rios et al. | Nature | View publication
- 2012 | Gene loss-of-function and live imaging in chick embryos | A. C. Rios et al. | Methods in Molecular Biology | View publication
- 2011 | Neural crest regulates myogenesis through the transient activation of NOTCH | A. C. Rios et al. | Nature | View publication
Members
| Anne Rios Group leader | Amber Wezenaar PhD Student | Amber Zeeman Technician |
| Britt Vervoort PostDoc | Celina Honhof Research Technician | Ellen Wehrens Senior researcher |
| Emma Bokobza Phd Student | Jessica Mazalo Postdoc | Mario Barrera Román Research Analyst |
| Marit Kruit Research Technician | Milo Molleson Computational analyst | Raphael Collot PhD student |
| Ravian van Ineveld Postdoc fellow | Rijndert Ariese Technician | Sam de Blank Bioinformatician |
| Uddeshya Pandey PhD student | Isabel Corado Ramis Research Assistant | Amal Elfidha Postdoc |
| Daan Kloosterman PhD | Elenia Toccafondi Research Coordinator | Agnieszka Andres Lab Technician |