The Netherlands Cancer Institute – Antoni van Leeuwenhoek Hospital (NKI-AVL) is an integrated comprehensive cancer centre, combining a hospital and research laboratories in one independent organisation. The hospital accommodates 180 beds, including in-patient units for combined modality treatments and pharmacokinetics, a large Radiotherapy department and outpatient clinics. The laboratory covers all major areas of cancer research and includes many programs translating basic research findings into improved clinical cancer prevention, diagnosis and therapy. Basic researchers focus on molecular events that direct cell division, survival, differentiation and migration. Cell biologists are supported by excellent core facilities. The preclinical activities are clustered in the recently established Mouse Cancer Clinic: a large facility for maintenance of mouse strains with expert biotechnical staff and up-to-date equipment, including bioluminescence cameras, SPECT-CT, MRI imaging and an image-guided micro beam mouse irradiator (www.nki.nl). The research activities of the Division of Radiotherapy are clustered around three themes: (1) improving treatment accuracy, (2) enhancing radiation response by dose escalation, chemoradiation and biological response modifiers, and (3) predicting treatment outcome and prognosis by genetic profiling, functional imaging and biomarkers. The following areas of expertise are relevant to this project: Clinical Research. This program covers all major tumor sites and focuses on improved delineation, planning, delivery and verification techniques (Stereotactic IGRT for lung cancer; Probability based treatment planning; High precision IGRT; Adaptive radiotherapy strategies; (Preoperative) Hypofractionated radiotherapy.
