Bas Koekkoek, PhD

Sebastiaan (Bas) Koekkoek received his doctorate degree in medicine at Erasmus MC in Rotterdam. He obtained his PhD at the department of Neuroscience (Erasmus MC) in 2004 with his thesis ‘Molecular mechanisms underlying associative learning’. Since then, Bas has been working at the department of Neuroscience mainly in the role of rapid prototyper of new technology and techniques for neuroscience. Many of the neuroscientific technologies currently used at Erasmus MC have sprouted from his work and have been successfully commercialized. For example, Erasmus Ladder is a successful product, best described as a fully automated cerebellar phenotyping solution for mice. The first systems were designed, built and coded by Bas and currently systems are marketed, produced and sold under license by an external company. More than 40 units are operational in laboratories and companies everywhere in the world.

Sebastiaan previously was a head of product development at Neurasmus BV that was developing, selling and maintaining turn-key Eyeblink systems to research and commercial labs in the EU and US. Many of the underlying principles and knowledge generated in developing custom eye blink solutions are now forming the basis of BlinkLab technology.

Scientifically the interests of Bas are on the interplay between neuronal pathology and the effects on behavior. In addition, Bas has a large interest in new technology and how it could be used to measure behavior.