Alex Van Belkum PhD

Professor Alex van Belkum, PhD is Dutch, and graduated as a biologist at the University of Leiden, The Netherlands in 1983. In 1988 he did a PhD examination in Biochemistry at the same University. In 1996 he succeeded in a second PhD examination, subject Molecular Microbiology, at the Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Between 1988-1990 he was involved in malaria vaccine research as a research scientist at the Biomedical Primate Research Centre BPRC-TNO, Department of Infectious Diseases, Rijswijk, The Netherlands. Between 1990-1991 he was Head of the Department of Infectious Diseases, MedScand Ingeny B.V., Leiden, The Netherlands after which he joined as a staff member the Department of Molecular Biology, Diagnostic Centre SSDZ, Delft, The Netherlands (1991-1994).
In both jobs the focus was on the development of molecular tests for the detection and characterization of infectious pathogens. From 1994 onwards until 2010 he was staff member at the Erasmus university Medical Center Rotterdam EMCR, Department of Medical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Between 2002 and 2010 he was Head of the Unit Research and Development of the Department before. From 2003 onwards he is (honorary) Professor of Molecular Microbiology at Erasmus MC.
From 2010 to 2011 he worked for bioMérieux as R&D Director in the La Balme Microbiology Unit. Since 2011 Van Belkum is Corporate Vice President R&D Microbiology at bioMerieux (La Balme les Grottes, France). He there heads an international team of 130-150 researchers in the field of in vitro diagnostics in the field of primarily bacterial diseases.