Matthijs Verhage

Prof. dr. Matthijs Verhage obtained his PhD at the University of Amsterdam in 1990 (cum laude). He received post-doctoral training at the labs of prof. David G. Nicholls (Dundee, UK) and the recent Nobel laureate prof. Thomas C. Südhof (Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Dallas, USA).

Since 2000 he is full professor and head of the Department of Functional Genomics at the VU University Medical Center and a department of the same name at the Faculty of Life Sciences, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

In 2003 he became the first chairman of the Center for Neurogenomics and Cognitive Research (CNCR).

Matthijs Verhage was co-founder and vice chair of the Dutch NeuroBsik Mouse Phenomics consortium, partner of the European research consortium EU-Synapse, vice chair of the consortia EuroSpin and SynSys and is founder and vice chair of the H2020 consortium COSYN.

In 2001 he was the Pionier/VICI laureate of the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (NWO).

In 2007, dr. Verhage was one of four founders of the spin out company Synaptologics BV (Sylics BV), that was acquired by Innoser in 2022.

In 2012 he received the ERC Ideas Advanced Grant of the European Research Council.

Since 2015, dr. Verhage coordinates together with prof. A.B. Smit the worldwide SYNGO consortium supported by the Broad Institute at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston, USA and the Simons Foundation, New York, USA, to promote data utilization in synapse biology.

Since 2021 he is scientific director of the N=You center for precision medicine of Amsterdam UMC.

In 2021 dr. Verhage established together with prof. Nadif Kasri and he currently chairs the Dutch national consortium Brainmodel, funded by ZonMW (€5M) to develop cell-based diagnostics for rare neurodevelopmental disorders.

In 2022 he established and currently chairs ESCO, an investigator-led consortium with partners in eight EU countries, to promote research on STXBP1-related disorders, perform a natural history study and assist in clinical trials.

In 2022 dr. Verhage established, together with dr. Claudia Persoon and prof. dr. Ruud Toonen, Neurospector, an academic CRO specializing in upscaled, standardized cellular assays in human IPSC-derived human neurons with an annual turnover of €2M,-.

In 2025, he established and currently chairs iSNARE a European consortium funded by the EU ERDERA program to develop intervention strategies for SNAREopathies.

Some key papers of the last years:

ANDRE, T.*, VAN BERKEL, A. A.*, SINGH, G.*, ABUALROUS, E. T., DIWAN, G. D., SCHMENGER, T., BRAUN, L., MALSAM, J., TOONEN, R. F., FREUND, C., RUSSELL, R. B., VERHAGE, M*. & SOLLNER*, T. H. 2024. Reduced Protein Stability of 11 Pathogenic Missense STXBP1/MUNC18-1 Variants and Improved Disease Prediction. Biol Psychiatry.

BROUWER, M., FARZANA, F., KOOPMANS, F., CHEN, N., BRUNNER, J. W., OLDANI, S., LI, K. W., VAN WEERING, J. R., SMIT, A. B., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2019. SALM1 controls synapse development by promoting F-actin/PIP2-dependent Neurexin clustering. EMBO J, 38, e101289.

BRUNNER, J. W.*, LAMMERTSE, H. C. A.*, VAN BERKEL, A. A.*, KOOPMANS, F., LI, K. W., SMIT, A. B., TOONEN, R. F., VERHAGE, M.* & VAN DER SLUIS, S.* 2023. Power and optimal study design in iPSC-based brain disease modelling. Mol Psychiatry, 28, 1545-1556.

DE JONG, A. P., MEIJER, M., SAARLOOS, I., CORNELISSE, L. N., TOONEN, R. F., SORENSEN, J. B. & VERHAGE, M. 2016. Phosphorylation of synaptotagmin-1 controls a post-priming step in PKC-dependent presynaptic plasticity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 113, 5095-100.

EMPERADOR-MELERO, J., HUSON, V., VAN WEERING, J., BOLLMANN, C., FISCHER VON MOLLARD, G., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2018. Vti1a/b regulate synaptic vesicle and dense core vesicle secretion via protein sorting at the Golgi. Nat Commun, 9, 3421.

HE, E., WIERDA, K., VAN WESTEN, R., BROEKE, J. H., TOONEN, R. F., CORNELISSE, L. N. & VERHAGE, M. 2017. Munc13-1 and Munc18-1 together prevent NSF-dependent de-priming of synaptic vesicles. Nat Commun, 8, 15915.

KOOPMANS, F., VAN NIEROP, P. [……] SMIT, A. B.* & VERHAGE, M.* 2019. SynGO: An Evidence-Based, Expert-Curated Knowledge Base for the Synapse. Neuron, 103, 217-234 e4.

KOVACEVIC, J., HOUY, S., PIRES, J., KADKOVA, A., LI, Z., LAMMERTSE, H. C. A., MARTINS, J. S., OTTL, M., WIERDA, K., WORTEL, J., SORENSEN, J. B.* & VERHAGE, M.* 2026. Phenotypic diversity is caused by non-linear genetic interactions between two SNAREopathy genes. Mol Psychiatry.

KOVACEVIC, J., MAROTEAUX, G., SCHUT, D., LOOS, M., DUBEY, M., PITSCH, J., REMMELINK, E., KOOPMANS, B., CROWLEY, J., CORNELISSE, L. N., SULLIVAN, P. F., SCHOCH, S., TOONEN, R. F., STIEDL, O. & VERHAGE, M. 2018. Protein instability, haploinsufficiency, and cortical hyper-excitability underlie STXBP1 encephalopathy. Brain, 141, 1350-1374.

MEIJER, M., DORR, B., LAMMERTSE, H. C., BLITHIKIOTI, C., VAN WEERING, J. R., TOONEN, R. F., SOLLNER, T. H. & VERHAGE, M. 2018. Tyrosine phosphorylation of Munc18-1 inhibits synaptic transmission by preventing SNARE assembly. EMBO J, 37, 300-320.

MEIJER, M., OTTL, M., YANG, J., SUBKHANGULOVA, A., KUMAR, A., FENG, Z., VAN VOORST, T. W., GROFFEN, A. J., VAN WEERING, J. R. T., ZHANG, Y. & VERHAGE, M. 2024. Tomosyns attenuate SNARE assembly and synaptic depression by binding to VAMP2-containing template complexes. Nat Commun, 15, 2652.

MURPHY, F. H., ABRAMIAN, A., KLAASSEN, R. V., KOOPMANS, F., PERSOON, C. M., SMIT, A. B., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2025. RIM and MUNC13 membrane-binding domains are essential for neuropeptide secretion. J Cell Biol, 224.

PERSOON, C. M., HOOGSTRAATEN, R. I., NASSAL, J. P., VAN WEERING, J. R. T., KAESER, P. S., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2019. The RAB3-RIM Pathway Is Essential for the Release of Neuromodulators. Neuron, 104, 1065-1080 e12.

PERSOON, C. M., MORO, A., NASSAL, J. P., FARINA, M., BROEKE, J. H., ARORA, S., DOMINGUEZ, N., VAN WEERING, J. R., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2018. Pool size estimations for dense-core vesicles in mammalian CNS neurons. EMBO J, 37.

SAN JUAN, I. G., NASH, L. A., SMITH, K. S., [….] VERHAGE, M. & EGGAN, K. 2022. Loss of mouse Stmn2 function causes motor neuropathy. Neuron, 110, 4031.

SCHMITZ, S. K., KING, C., KORTLEVEN, C., HUSON, V., KROON, T., KEVENAAR, J. T., SCHUT, D., SAARLOOS, I., HOETJES, J. P., DE WIT, H., STIEDL, O., SPIJKER, S., LI, K. W., MANSVELDER, H. D., SMIT, A. B., CORNELISSE, L. N., VERHAGE, M. & TOONEN, R. F. 2016. Presynaptic inhibition upon CB1 or mGlu2/3 receptor activation requires ERK/MAPK phosphorylation of Munc18-1. EMBO J, 35, 1236-50.

TRUBETSKOY, V.,  [….] VERHAGE M……O’DONNOVAN. M. 2022. Mapping genomic loci implicates genes and synaptic biology in schizophrenia. Nature, 604, 502-508.

VAN BOVEN, M. A., MESTRONI, M., ZWIJNENBURG, P. J. G., VERHAGE, M. & CORNELISSE, L. N. 2024. A de novo missense mutation in synaptotagmin-1 associated with neurodevelopmental disorder desynchronizes neurotransmitter release. Mol Psychiatry.

VAN WESTEN, R., POPPINGA, J., DIEZ ARAZOLA, R., TOONEN, R. F. & VERHAGE, M. 2021. Neuromodulator release in neurons requires two functionally redundant calcium sensors. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 118.

VERHAGE, M. & SORENSEN, J. B. 2020. SNAREopathies: Diversity in Mechanisms and Symptoms. Neuron, 107, 22-37.