Marco van Vulpen is a professor of radiotherapy at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). Apart from that he is the medical director of Holland Proton Therapy Center (HollandPTC) in Delft. As a part of Medical Delta, he is also appointed as a professor at Erasmus Medical Center (Erasmus MC) and the Technical University of Delft. Separately, he is professor and faculty member at the department of radiotherapy at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

More information about Marco van Vulpen

Marco van Vulpen is a professor of radiotherapy at the Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC). Apart from that he is the medical director of Holland Proton Therapy Center (HollandPTC) in Delft. As a part of Medical Delta, he is also appointed as a professor at Erasmus Medical Center (Erasmus MC) and the Technical University of Delft. Separately, he is professor and faculty member at the department of radiotherapy at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Radiotherapy

Approximately 50% of all patients receive radiotherapy as part of their treatment. Radiotherapy has evolved in the previous decennia towards a treatment with a high precision, where the treatment is daily adapted with regard to the position and the movement of tumors and where aggressive areas receive more radiation compared to areas of the tumor which are less aggressive.

Radiotherapy is delivered by a photon beam. Photons are energy packages which damage everything they meet during their travel through the body. By administering these photons from several sites it is possible to deliver the highest dose to the tumor while delivering less dose to the surrounding normal tissues. It is now possible to deliver radiotherapy by a proton beam. Protons are particles that stop completely after delivering the radiation, in contrast to photons. This results in the absence of any radiation behind the proton beam and will spare more of the healthy surrounding tissues. The added value of proton therapy still needs to be determined, also in the light of costs, before this therapy can be standardly applies to more patients.

Academic career

Dr. van Vulpen obtained his M.D. at the University of Amsterdam and his Ph.D. (2003) at the University of Utrecht, both in the Netherlands. The title of his thesis was ‘hyperthermia for prostate cancer’.

In 2011 he was appointed full professor at the university of Utrecht and held his inaugural speech called the ‘End of Radiotherapy’. Since 2013 he was chair of the department of Radiotherapy at the University medical Center Utrecht, the Netherlands, where a 1.5 Tesla MRI linear accelerator was developed. He was clinical chair of the International Consortium, ATLANTIC, on the worldwide clinical introduction of the MRI linear accelerator. He currently serves as adjunct professor and faculty member at the department of Radiotherapy at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas. Since 2016 he is appointed as medical director of the Holland Proton Therapy Center in Delft, the Netherland, and is appointed as professor at the Leiden UMC, Erasmus MC and TU Delft. On October 11, 2019 he presented his second inaugural speech, entitled: “critical mass”. His major research interests include the development, clinical translation off different radiotherapy interventions, like the MRI linac and proton therapy, especially with regard to the value proposition.

Prizes and honourable appointments

Van Vulpen received the ‘Alon Dembo visiting professor’ award at the University of Toronto (2012) and the ‘Donal Hollywood’ award at the European Society of radiotherapy and oncology (ESTRO) (2016). He is honorary member of the Belgian society for radiotherapy (ABRO-BVRO).