Credits: Tim Koopmans, Copyright: Hubrecht Institute 13 August 2025 Tim Koopmans awarded Dekker Grant for research into heart repair Back to news Tim Koopmans, postdoctoral researcher in the Van Rooij group, has been awarded a Senior Scientist Dekker Grant from the Dutch Heart Foundation. With the grant of €620,000, he can further investigate the heart’s ability to repair itself after damage. When the human heart is damaged, this damage is permanent. Heart cells that, for example, suffer from oxygen deprivation during a heart attack die off. Our body cannot restore the heart tissue afterwards, which results in scar tissue and may lead to heart failure. In the case of larger scars, the heart tries to compensate by increasing the heart rate, raising the filling and pressure in the vascular system, and enlarging the unaffected part of the heart. Initially, this can partly restore heart function, but in the long term it leads to a gradual, irreversible decline of the heart, and may ultimately result in death. With the Dekker Grant, Koopmans will study a remarkable animal that can repair its heart: the spiny mouse. In spiny mice, the supporting cells in the heart tissue, the fibroblasts, help repair damage. Koopmans hopes to learn from the spiny mouse how this works, in order to eventually enable the human heart to repair damage as well. A remarkable mouse In recent years, Koopmans and his colleagues have already lifted part of the veil. By comparing spiny mice to common mice – which, like humans, cannot repair their hearts – they discovered that the spiny mouse is exceptionally resilient to heart damage caused by oxygen deprivation, even when this results in scarring. Lost heart function is largely restored, and spiny mice are hardly affected by the aforementioned compensatory mechanisms. The fibroblasts of spiny mice secrete substances that suppress inflammation and modify the properties of scar tissue, enabling surviving heart muscle cells to survive and proliferate. This process is known as regeneration. Tim Koopmans Springboard Thanks to the Dekker Grant, Koopmans can now build on these findings. “This grant validates my persistence in studying heart repair in an unconventional animal model,” he says. “Personally, it is a springboard to the next step in my career. For our group, it brings the stability, resources, and freedom to further develop our ideas.” Unraveling heart repair In his follow-up research, Koopmans will focus particularly on the substances secreted by spiny mouse fibroblasts that stimulate surrounding heart muscle cells to repair themselves. “At this point, we do not know which substances these are, nor exactly how they promote repair of the heart muscle tissue,” Koopmans explains. “Only when we know this, we can investigate whether we can influence heart repair using these substances.” Joining forces Koopmans and his colleagues will collaborate extensively with experts both in the Netherlands and abroad. For example, they will work with Mauro Giacca, a leading gene therapy expert from Italy, who will help them deliver the fibroblast-derived substances into mouse hearts. Kelly Stecker from Utrecht University will lead the chemical analyses to identify the fibroblast-derived substances. And thanks to Anneline te Riele from UMC Utrecht, they will have access to human heart tissue for their research. Repairing the human heart At the end of his research project, Koopmans hopes to be able to direct the heart of common mice towards repair instead of deterioration. If successful, this will be a first step towards applications in humans. “In the long term, I hope our discoveries will lead to regenerative treatments for heart disease becoming a reality.” About the Dekker Grant The Senior Scientist Dekker Grant from the Dutch Heart Foundation is a personal grant that enables scientists to establish their own independent research line in a cardiovascular field. Researchers from various disciplines, such as (pre)clinical research, behavioral studies, epidemiology, and pharmaceutical research, are eligible for a Dekker Grant. A key requirement is that the research must contribute to improving cardiovascular health in Dutch society.
