Bart Crusius was born on 4 June 1950 in Amsterdam. In 1969 he started to study Biology at the University of Amsterdam. In 1973 he obtained his degree in Biology with Chemistry as second major. In the years thereafter he followed several preparatory courses in Experimental Oncology and Microbiology. He did practical work at the Department of Molecular Biology and the National Cancer Institute.
From 1987 he started to work at the Department of Human Genetics at the VU University medical center Amsterdam, participating in several projects. Since the creation of the section Gastrointestinal Immunology in 1992 he worked at the Laboratory of Gastrointestinal Immunogenetics (currently the Laboratory of Immunogenetics), actively participating in national and international projects. Since 1992 he coordinated several research lines and actively participated in the design of the premises to perform immunogenetic and immunological work. In December 2002 he successfully defended a PhD thesis entitled “The immunogenetics of chronic inflammatory and autoimmune disease” at the VU University, Amsterdam. His main interest and research lines are on autoimmune diseases: rheumatic diseases, multiple sclerosis, and coeliac disease. Bart retired in September 2015 but he will continue his activities at the Laboratory of Immunogenetics part-time under employment of Tubascan Ltd focusing on rheumatic diseases and rolling out the CeliaSCAN test.