In my research a focused on various aspects of bone and cartilage formation in relation to disorders of bone growth by endochondral ossification and osteoporosis from a developmental biological perspective and started focusing on understanding the cellular and molecular basis of hyaline cartilage formation. I realized that this knowledge had great potential for translation into strategies to repair degenerative joint diseases. I also realized that for the translation of this knowledge into clinically applicable solutions for treatment of cartilage diseases, technological input was paramount. This could not be easily realized in the clinical setting of the LUMC. For this reason I took, in 2007, the opportunity to continue my work at the Tissue Regeneration group headed by prof. Clemens van Blitterswijk at the MIRA Institute for Biomedical Technology and Technical Medicine of the University of Twente as associate professor. This career move provided me with access to state of the art technology in biomaterial research and in particular polymer chemistry, tissue engineering and controlled drug delivery and proved to be extremely successful. Starting from scratch in 2007, my research group has exponentially grown and consists presently of 13 PhD-students and 1 technician, all paid by external funding, which I raised in the past years, and two assistant professors. My work is characterized by a multidisciplinary approach in which I combine the latest advancements in polymer chemistry and biomaterial processing, particularly in hydrogel formation, with tissue engineering, controlled drug delivery, animal experimentation, medicine and developmental biology of bone and cartilage. It is aimed at the development of innovative solutions for the treatment of degenerative cartilage disease.