Senior Expert on cancer research and innovation, EU Cancer Mission – science and stakeholders

DG Research & Innovation, European Commission

Jan-Willem van de Loo joined the European Commission in 2003. He is a Senior Expert on cancer research and innovation. Within the Horizon Europe EU Cancer Mission (2021-2030), he’s responsible for science and stakeholder engagement. In 2019-2020, he led a team co-creating the EU Mission on Cancer. Work on related policy initiatives includes the Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan (2021-2030), and contributions to public-public and public-private R&I partnerships and cancer-centred Joint Actions. He has extensive experience with collaborative project management, international cancer research and innovation policy activities and stakeholder interactions. He graduated in Biology at the University of Utrecht in 1991, following a year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Medical School Graduate Program. He worked as a junior scientist on blood coagulation at Sanquin, Amsterdam and obtained his PhD in cell biology at the Centre for Human Genetics at the University of Leuven in 1999. He held three postdoctoral positions in cancer research in Italy, including a Marie-Curie postdoctoral fellowship at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan.

Updated: September 2026