Bastiaan B.J. Tops

Tops (b. 1978) studied Medical Biology in Utrecht. He obtained his PhD in 2007 studying the biogenesis and regulation of small RNAs (siRNA and miRNAs) in the model organism Caenorhabditis elegens. He finished his post-doctoral training in 2013 to become the first Clinical Molecular Biologist in Pathology and is registered as such at the Dutch Society for Pathology (NVVP). After his training he joined the staff of the Radboudumc, Nijmegen and was responsible for the implementation of novel (research) techniques in routine diagnostics. The Radboudumc was the first hospital in the Netherlands that implemented Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) in routine pathology diagnostics in 2013. Since then he has been responsible for continued innovation and quality aspects in routine diagnostics.

In 2016, Tops joined the Princess Máxima Center and was initially tasked to develop a vision for the diagnostic laboratory. He subsequently joined the Center full-time and is now responsible for the Laboratory of Childhood Cancer Pathology. One of his main objectives is to ‘integrate’ research and diagnostics by implementing ‘research’ techniques and findings into a diagnostic setting and thereby improving (precision) diagnostics. 

Tops is an associate editor at BMC Cancer and a board member of the section Clinical Molecular and Experimental Pathology of the NVVP (Dutch Society of Pathology). He is also a member of the cieBOD (Commissie Beoordeling Oncologische Diagnostiek) which determines the minimal requirements for diagnostic oncology tests in The Netherlands.