His expertise and research focuses on neonatal brain function and development of children, particularly of those children who experience a difficult start at birth and need to be admitted to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). The aim of the neonatal team of docters and nurses in Groningen is to improve the long-term outcome of the NICU children, by investigating potential risk factors in relation to various non-invasive methods to monitor neonatal brain function. He is member of the General Movements Trust, an international group of researchers, together with whom he developed a method to assess brain function in young infants from their spontaneous movements. Since 2011 he is ambassador of the foundation Make a Memory.