Matthias LütolfMatthias Lutolf is Full Professor at EPFL’s Institute of Bioengineering, with a cross appointment in the Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering. Lutolf was trained as a Materials Engineer at ETH Zurich where he also carried out his PhD studies (with Jeffrey Hubbell) that were awarded with an ETH medal. He continued his research training as a Post-Doctoral Fellow in Stem Cell Biology (with Helen Blau) at Stanford University. He has served as the Director of the Institute of Bioengineering from 2014 to 2018. Lutolf is an internationally recognized leader in the fields of stem cell bioengineering and tissue engineering. His research program uniquely combines stem cell biology with engineering principles and quantitative thinking. His team, composed of engineers, chemists, physicists, cell and developmental biologists, strives to develop technologies that have true biological and medicinal function and applicability. Lutolf’s work has led to more than 110 peer-reviewed scientific publications, many of which published in highly reputed journals, more than 25 patents, and the commercialization of several products. Current research in the Lutolf lab is focused on the bioengineering of miniature tissues, termed organoids, that are generated from self-organizing stem cells.
Georges WagnièresGeorges Wagnières received his diploma degree (MSc) in physics from the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1986. He obtained his doctorate in science (PhD) in physics (Biomedical optics) from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne (EPFL) in 1992 and did a postdoctoral work in the Wellman Laboratories of Photomedicine (Harvard Medical School), Boston, USA, from 1993 to 1994. He also obtained a Master degree in Management of Technology delivered by the Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC) of Lausanne University and the EPFL in 2001. Georges Wagnières manages a research group active in the fields of: - Detection of early superficial cancers by fluorescence imaging. - Characterization of early superficial cancers by high magnification narrow band imaging. - In vivo and in vitro measurement of the vascular and tissular oxygen concentration by time-resolved luminescence spectroscopy and imaging. - Preclinical and clinical study of new photosensitizers for photodynamic therapy (PDT). - Treatment of neurodegenerative conditions (Alzheimer, Parkinson's diseases) by photobiomodulation. - Preclinical and clinical photodynamic therapy of inflammatory bowel diseases and atheroscerotic plaque. - Improvement of the selective vascular extravasation of chemotherapeutic agents by PDT. - Monitoring the light dosimetry during PDT by fluorescence spectroscopy and imaging. - Monitoring laser treatments of the retina by reflectance imaging. - Light dosimetry and tissue optical spectroscopy. - Radiometry. - Development of light delivery systems for biomedical applications. Georges Wagnières is also co-founder and was chairman of one spin-off companies: - Medlight SA, founded in July 1997, which develops, produces and commercializes light distributors for photodynamic therapy. Georges Wagnières has currently authored more than 235 papers (more than 150 in international journals with review board) and is inventor of 18 patents. He supervised 12 PhD students up to now, and currently teaches biomedical optics and photomedicine in master programs and doctoral schools. In addition, he gives the course entitled "Physique Générale I" to biology first year students registered to the Biology School of the Lausanne's University. MAIN PUBLICATIONS Please visit: https://www.epfl.ch/labs/lifmet/wagnieres/publications/ Patrick AebischerPatrick Aebischer a achevé une formation en Médecine (1980) et en Neurosciences (1983) aux Universités de Genève et de Fribourg en Suisse.
De 1984 à 1992, Patrick Aebischer a travaillé à Brown University (USA) au sein du Département des Neurosciences et au Département des Biomatériaux et des Organes Artificiels en tant que Professeur assistant, puis Professeur associé.
En 1992, Patrick Aebischer a été nommé Professeur de la Division Autonome de Recherche Chirurgicale et du Centre de Thérapie Génique (DARC) au Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois (CHUV) à Lausanne.
En 1999, Le Conseil Fédéral a nommé Patrick Aebischer en tant que Président de l'Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). Il a pris ses fonctions à la Présidence de lEPFL en mars 2000, position qu'il a occupée jusqu'au 31 décembre 2016.
Patrick Aebischer est membre de maintes sociétés professionnelles, tant en Europe quaux Etats-Unis.
Patrick Aebischer a fondé trois start-up de biotechnologies. Il siège au conseil d'administration de Lonza, de Logitech et de Nestlé. Il préside également l'advisory board du Novartis Venture Fund. Patrick Aebischer est membre du conseil de fondation du Festival de Jazz de Montreux, du Festival de Verbier et de la Fondation Jacobs.
Les recherches quil poursuit actuellement dans son laboratoire se concentrent sur le développement d'approches de thérapie cellulaire et de transfert génique pour le traitement des maladies neurodégénératives.
Jean-Jacques MeisterA Swiss citizen, Jean-Jacques Meister was born in 1950. He received a diploma in electrical engineering, then a diploma in physics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL). He joined the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and obtained a PhD in1983. From 1984 to 1990, he worked in different areas of biophysics and biomedical engineering. His main contributions concern novel noninvasive methods for the prevention and diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases: mechanical properties of the arterial wall, arterial hemodynamics, and Doppler ultrasonography. In 1990, he was recruited as a full professor of experimental physics at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne. He was director of the laboratory of biomedical engineering until 2001, then director of the laboratory of cell biophysics. His fields of research are cellular biophysics: cytoskeleton dynamics, motility & adhesion of cells and calcium dynamics in smooth muscle cells. He spent a sabbatical leave in 2000 at the famous Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, Massachusetts -USA to improve his skills in molecular and cellular biology. His teaching activities include courses in general physics, Newtonian mechanics, biomedical engineering and biophysics presented to undergraduate and graduate EPFL students in physics and engineering. He is author or co-author of more than 230 scientific papers & book chapters and 8 international patents.
Paul Joseph DysonPaul Dyson joined the Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering at the EPFL in 2002 where he heads the Laboratory of Organometallic and Medicinal Chemistry and between 2008 and 2016 chaired the Institute. He has won several prizes including the Werner Prize of the Swiss Chemical Society in 2004, the Award for Outstanding Achievements in Bioorganometallic Chemistry in 2010, the Centennial Luigi Sacconi Medal of the Italian Chemical Society in 2011, the Bioinorganic Chemistry Award of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2015, the European Sustainable Chemistry Award of the European Chemical Society in 2018 and the Green Chemistry Award from the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2020. He is also a Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher and has an H-index >110 (web of science and google scholar). He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry in 2010, a Fellow of the European Academy of Science in 2019 and a life-long fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2020. Over the years he has held visiting professorships at the University of Bourgogne, University of Pierre et Marie Curie, University of Vienna, University of Rome Tor Vergara, Chimie Paristech and Shangai Jiao Tong University.Since 2016 he has been Member of the Council of the Division of Mathematics, Natural and Engineering Sciences at the Swiss National Science Foundation.Between 2016-2021 he has been Member of the Council of the Division of Mathematics, Natural and Engineering Sciences at the Swiss National Science Foundation. In 2021 he was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Basic Sciences.
Nikolaos StergiopoulosEducation
MTE, Managing the Technology Enterprise Program (2000), IMD, Lausanne
Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering & Engineering Mechanics (1990) Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa.
MS in Biomedical Engineering (1987) Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa.
Diploma in Mechanical Engineering (1985) National Technical University of Athens.
Professional Activities
2002 - present: Professor and director of LHTC
2010 - present: Founder and director of Rheon Medical SA, Préverenges, Switzerland
2008 - present: Founder and director of Antlia S.A., PSE-C, EPFL campus, Switzerland
1998 - 2007: Founder and Scientific Director of EndoArt S.A., Lausanne, Switzerland
1996 - 2002: Assistant professor at the Biomedical Engineering Laboratory, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland.
1991 - 1996: Research Associate at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology - Lausanne
1990 - 1991: Lecturer, Iowa State University
Freddy RadtkeFreddy Radtke obtained his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from the University of Zürich in 1994. In 1995, he started his postdoctoral research in the laboratory of Michel Aguet at Genentech, Inc. (San Francisco, USA). In 1997, he returned to Switzerland with Michel Aguet and finished his postdoctoral fellowship at the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research (ISREC) in Lausanne. From 1999‑2005, he was a group leader and Associate Member at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research. Freddy Radtke then joined ISREC in January 2006 as a senior scientist and in July 2006, he was appointed Associate Professor at the EPFL School of Life Sciences
Cathrin BriskenCathrin Brisken, MD, PhD, is Associate Professor of Life Sciences at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL). Dr. Brisken is internationally recognized for her work on endocrine control of mammary gland development and breast carcinogenesis.
Dr. Brisken received her MD and her PhD degree in Biophysics from the Georg August University of Göttingen, Germany. She completed her postdoctoral work in cancer biology with Dr. R.A. Weinberg at the Whitehead Institute of Biomedical Research in Cambridge, MA, USA. She previously held appointments at the Cancer Center of the Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston and the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research (ISREC).
Research in Dr. Brisken’s laboratory focuses on the cellular and molecular underpinnings of estrogen and progesterone receptor signaling in the breast and the respective roles of these hormones and hormonally active compounds in carcinogenesis. The aim is to understand how recurrent exposures to endogenous and exogenous hormones contribute to breast carcinogenesis in order to better prevent and treat the disease. The laboratory has pioneered in vivo approaches to genetically dissect the role of the reproductive hormones in driving mouse mammary gland development and shown how they control intercellular communication. Dr. Brisken’s group has developed ex vivo and humanized mouse models using patient samples to study hormone action in human tissues in normal settings and during disease progression.
Dr. Brisken is member of the International Breast Cancer Study Group (IBCSG) Biological Protocol Working Group. She served as Dean of EPFL Doctoral School (more than 2000 PhD students in 18 PhD programs), as member of the Hinterzartener Kreis, the oncology think-tank associated with the German Science Foundation, and numerous Swiss, European, and AACR committees. She co-founded the International Cancer Prevention Institute.
Jürgen BruggerI am a Professor of Microengineering and co-affiliated to Materials Science. Before joining EPFL I was at the MESA Research Institute of Nanotechnology at the University of Twente in the Netherlands, at the IBM Zurich Research Laboratory, and at the Hitachi Central Research Laboratory, in Tokyo, Japan. I received a Master in Physical-Electronics and a PhD degree from Neuchâtel University, Switzerland. Research in my laboratory focuses on various aspects of MEMS and Nanotechnology. My group contributes to the field at the fundamental level as well as in technological development, as demonstrated by the start-ups that spun off from the lab. In our research, key competences are in micro/nanofabrication, additive micro-manufacturing, new materials for MEMS, increasingly for wearable and biomedical applications. Together with my students and colleagues we published over 200 peer-refereed papers and I had the pleasure to supervise over 25 PhD students. Former students and postdocs have been successful in receiving awards and starting their own scientific careers. I am honoured for the appointment in 2016 as Fellow of the IEEE “For contributions to micro and nano manufacturing technology”. In 2017 my lab was awarded an ERC AdvG in the field of advanced micro-manufacturing.
Douglas HanahanDouglas Hanahan, born in Seattle, Washington, USA, received a bachelors degree in Physics from MIT (1976), and a Ph.D. in Biophysics from Harvard (1983). He worked at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York (1978-88) initially as a graduate student and then as a group leader. From 1988-2010 he was on the faculty of the Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics at UCSF in San Francisco. He has been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (2007), the Institute of Medicine (USA) (2008), the US National Academy of Science (2009), and EMBO (2010). In 2011, Hanahan received an honorary degree from the University of Dundee (UK).
Didier TronoAfter obtaining an M.D. from the University of Geneva and completing a clinical training in pathology, internal medicine and infectious diseases in Geneva and at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, Didier Trono embarked in a scientific career at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research of MIT. In 1990, he joined the faculty of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies to launch a center for AIDS research. He moved back to Europe seven years later, before taking the reins of the newly created EPFL School of Life Sciences, which he directed from 2004 to 2012. He is now actively engaged in the efforts of Switzerland to integrate new technologies in the fields of precision medicine and personalized health.
Dominique PiolettiDominique Pioletti received his Master in Physics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) in 1992. He pursued his education in the same Institution and obtained his PhD in biomechanics in 1997. He developed original constitutive laws taking into account viscoelasticity in large deformations. Then he spent two years at UCSD as post-doc fellow acquiring know-how in cell and molecular biology. He was interested in particular to gene expression of bone cells in contact to orthopedic implant. In April 2006, Dominique Pioletti was appointed Assistant Professor tenure-track at the EPFL and is director of the Laboratory of Biomechanical Orthopedics. His research topics include biomechanics and tissue engineering of musculo-skeletal tissues; mechano-transduction in bone; development of orthopedic implant as drug delivery system. Since 2013, he has been promoted to the rank of Associate Professor.
Maria del Carmen Sandi PerezACADEMIC POSITION:
Professor, Director of the Laboratory of Behavioral Genetics, Brain Mind Institute, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland.
EDUCATION:
BS MS Salamanca, Spain, 1984
PhD Cajal Institute, CSIC, and University Autonoma of Madrid, Spain, 1988
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE:
Postdoc at INSERM, Bordeaux, France, and Cajal Institute Madrid, Spain, 1989-1990
Postdoc at the Open University, UK, 1991-1992, 1996
Research Associate, Cajal Institute, CSIC, Madrid, 1993-1995
Associate Professor Tenured, UNED University, Madrid, 1996-2003
Sabbatical Professor, University of Bern, Switzerland, 2002-2003
Assistant Professor Tenure-Track, EPFL, 2003-2007
Associate Professor Tenured, EPFL, 2007-2012
Full Professor, EPFL, 2012-
Director, Brain Mind Institute, EPFL, 2012-
PRINCIPAL BOARDS:
President, European Brain and Behavior Society (EBBS), 2009-2012
Editor-in-Chief Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience
Member of Scientific Advisory Panel, European College Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP)
Member of the European Dana Alliance for the Brain (EDAB)
Associate Editor Frontiers in Neuroscience
Editorial Board Member Neurobiology of Learning and Memory
Editorial Board Member Journal of Psychiatry Research
Editorial Board Member Stress
Editorial Board Member Biology of Mood and Anxiety Disorders
Editorial Board Member Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews
Philippe RenaudPhilippe Renaud is Professor at the Microsystem Laboratory (LMIS4) at EPFL. He is also the scientific director of the EPFL Center of MicroNanoTechnology (CMI). His main research area is related to micronano technologies in biomedical applications (BioMEMS) with emphasis on cell-chips, nanofluidics and bioelectronics. Ph. Renaud is invloved in many scientifics papers in his research area. He received his diploma in physics from the University of Neuchâtel (1983) and his Ph.D. degree from the University of Lausanne (1988). He was postdoctoral fellow at University of California, Berkeley (1988-89) and then at the IBM Zürich Research Laboratory in Switzerland (1990-91). In 1992, he joined the Sensors and Actuators group of the Swiss Center for Electronics and Microtechnology (CSEM) at Neuchâtel, Switzerland. He was appointed assistant professor at EPFL in 1994 and full professor in 1997. In summer 1996, he was visiting professor at the Tohoku University, Japan. Ph. Renaud is active in several scientific committee (scientific journals, international conferences, scientific advisory boards of companies, PhD thesis committee). He is also co-founder of the Nanotech-Montreux conference. Ph. Renaud is committed to valorization of basic research through his involvement in several high-tech start-up companies.
Daniel ConstamDaniel Constam received his doctoral degree in Natural Sciences from ETH Zürich in the neuroimmunology group of Adriano Fontana (1993). For postdoctoral studies, he joined the laboratory of Elizabeth Robertson as an EMBO fellow at Harvard University to characterize proprotein convertase (PC) functions in mouse models of early embryogenesis (1994-1999). As an ISREC group leader (>2000) and Associate Professor at EPFL (>2007), he initially continued to study pluripotency and lineage differentiation during development and found that several secreted PCs jointly regulate cell-cell adhesion and TGFβ signaling pathways at the cross-roads of stem cell and cancer biology. To map the proteolytic activity of PCs and their relative distribution in exocytic or endocytic vesicles, his lab developed PC-specific FRET sensors for high resolution live imaging in normal cells and in tumour-host interactions. His studies on TGFβ signaling also identified the RNA-binding protein Bicc1 and its self-polymerization in membrane-less organelles as regulators of mRNA translation and cell metabolism that cooperate with primary cilia to prevent cystic growth in renal tubules and in pancreatic and bile ducts.
Françoise Gisou van der Goot GrunbergGisou van der Goot is the Head of the Laboratory of Cell and Membrane Biology, and founding member of the Global Health Institute (GHI), School of Life Sciences, at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne/EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne). She is currently Vice President for Responsible Transformation, in charge of reinforcing values such as inclusion and sustainability throughout the School’s campus. From 2014 to 2020, she was Dean of the School of Life Sciences. Before joining EPFL, she was Group Leader at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and subsequently Associate Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the same university. She studied engineering at the Ecole Centrale de Paris, then did a PhD in Molecular Biophysics at the Nuclear Energy Research Center, Saclay, France, followed by a postdoc at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg. She obtained an EMBO Young Investigator award in 2001, a Howard Hughes International Scholar award in 2005 and the Swiss Prix Marcel Benoist in 2009, the same year she was elected EMBO member (European Molecular Biology Organisation). She is a leader in the fields of molecular and cellular understanding of bacterial toxins, the organization of mammalian membranes and in organelles biology. Professor van der Goot is member of diverse scientific boards such as the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF), the Conseil suisse de la science et de la technologie (CSST) and the European Research Council (ERC).
