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Alumni portraits

IMP alumni form an impressive and global network of scientists in a broad range of roles. Here we celebrate our alumni and their inspirational careers in a collection of articles and interviews.

Some of the portraits below first appeared in the IMP newsletters over the past years. The “current” in the biography boxes refers to the alumni’s position as determined at the time of publication. 

A complete directory of principal investigator alumni is provided "former groups"; and a detailed account of Angelika Amon's work at the IMP by Kim Nasmyth can be found here to honour her nearly life-long ties with the IMP.

Jakob Fuhrmann
IMP PhD Student 2006 – 2011
Current: Senior Principal Scientist, Genentech, San Francisco
Portrait from 2024

Evgeny Kvon
IMP PhD Student 2008 - 2014
Current:  Assistant Professor, University of California, Irvine
Portrait from 2023 

Robert Prevedel
IMP Senior Postdoc 2011 – 2016
Current: Group Leader at EMBL Heidelberg
Portrait from 2023

Maria Sibilia
IMP Postdoc 1992 - 1995 (Wagner lab), IMP Staff Scientist 1996 - 1998
Current: Professor for Cellular and Molecular Tumorbiology and Head of the Center for Cancer Research, Medical University of Vienna
Portrait from 2022

Kanaga Sabapathy
IMP Postdoc 1994-1999 (Wagner lab)
Current: Professor / Head of Research Division, Director of Planning and Strategy, National Cancer Centre Singapore
Portrait from 2022

Silke Pichler
IMP Master Student 1995-1997 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Personal Trainer and Sports Coach, Professional Ironman Triathlete
Portrait from 2021

Snezhka Oliferenko
IMP PhD Student 1996-2000 (Huber lab)
Current: Group Leader, The Francis Crick Institute (UK)
Portrait from 2021

Philipp Selenko
IMP PhD Student 1996-1998 (Jenuwein lab)
Current: Professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
Portrait from 2021

Martin Breuss
IMP PhD Student/Postdoc 2009-2015 (Keays lab)
Current: Assistant Professor, University of Colorado
Portrait from 2021

Bernhard Payer
IMP Diploma Student 1999 – 2000 (Busslinger lab)
Current: Junior Group Leader at CRG Barcelona
Portrait from 2021

Giorgio Gilestro
VBC PhD Student 2002 - 2006 (Dickson lab)
Current: Principal Investigator and Senior Lecturer at Imperial College London
Portrait from 2020

Tomyuki Tanaka
IMP Postdoc and staff scientist 1996 - 2001 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Professor, University of Dundee; Wellcome Trust Principal Research Fellow
Portrait from 2020

Stephen L. Nutt
IMP PhD student and postdoc 1994-1998 (Busslinger lab)
Current: Professor at Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI)
Portrait from 2019

Andreas Hochwagen
IMP Diploma Student 1999-2000 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Associate Professor at New York University
Portrait from 2019

Frank Schnorrer
IMP Postdoc 2003 - 2008 (Dickson lab)
Current: Senior Group Leader, IDBM since 2016
Portrait from 2018

Attila Toth
IMP PhD Student 1996 - 2001 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Group Leader, TU Dresden since 2005,
Heisenberg Professor, TU Dresden since 2015
Portrait from 2018

Mark Petronczki
IMP PhD Student 2000 to 2004 (Nasmyth lab)
IMP Postdoc 2005 to 2007 (Peters lab)
Current: Director New Therapeutic Concept Discovery Oncology, Boehringer Ingelheim
Portrait from 2017

Andrew Straw
IMP Fellow 2010-2015
Current: Professor, University of Freiburg
Portrait from 2017

Camilla Sjögren
IMP Postdoc 1999-2001 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Professor, Karolinska Institutet
Portrait from 2014

Jörg Betschinger
IMP PhD student 2002-2004 (Knoblich lab)
Current: Group Leader, Friedrich Miescher Institute
Portrait from 2014

Hartmut Vodermaier
IMP PhD student 2000-2004 (Peters lab)
Current: Senior Editor, EMBO Journal
Portrait from 2013

Georg Schneider
IMP Bioinformatician 2001-2007
Current: Managing Director, IST Austria
Portrait from 2013

Christoph Lengauer
IMP Postdoc 1993-1994 (Weith lab)
Current: Executive Vice President, Blueprint Medicines
Portrait from 2012

Andrea Hutterer
IMP PhD student 2002-2006 (Knoblich lab)
Current: Platform Coordinator, Institute Curie
Portrait from 2012

Claudine Kraft
IMP PhD student 2001-2005 (Peters lab)
Current: Group Leader, Max F. Perutz Laboratories (MFPL)
Portrait from 2011

Christian Häring
IMP PhD student 2000-2003 (Nasmyth lab)
IMP Postdoc 2003-2004 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Group Leader, European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL)
Portrait from 2011

Sarah Bowman
IMP PhD student 2003-2007 (Knoblich lab)
Current: Staff Scientist, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard University
Portrait from 2010

Marieke von Lindern
IMP Postdoc 1992-1995 (Beug lab)
Current: Head of the Department, Sanquin Research
Portrait from 2010

Greg Emery
IMP Postdoc 2002-2004 (Knoblich lab)
Current: Associate Professor/PI, Université de Montréal/IRIC
Portrait from 2009

Rafal Ciosk
IMP Postdoc 1999-2000 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Principal Investigator, Friedrich Miescher Institute
Portrait from 2009

Silke Hauf
IMP Postdoc 1999-2003 (Peters lab)
Current: Assistant Professor, Virginia Tech
Portrait from 2008

Walter Schmidt
IMP Postdoc 1991-1994 (Birnstiel lab)
IMP Staff Scientist 1995-1997 (Birnstiel lab)
Current: CEO, Accanis
Portrait from 2008

Konrad Hochedlinger
IMP Master student 1998-1999 (Wagner lab)
Current: Professor, Harvard University
Portrait from 2008

Frank Uhlmann
IMP Postdoc 1997-2000 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Group Leader, Francis Crick Institute
Portrait from 2007

Angelika Amon
IMP Master and PhD student 1989-1993 (Nasmyth lab)
Current: Professor, MIT; HHMI Investigator
Portrait from 2007

Giulio Superti-Furga
IMP PhD student 1988-1990 (Busslinger lab)
Current: Scientific Director and CEO of CeMM
Portrait from 2007