Current Members

Timeline
Group Photos
Social Events

The lab currently has 27 members, although due to the overlap with the EMBL Heidelberg Director's Office, the exact count is hard to tell. We are 4 PhD students, 10 postdoctoral fellows and research scientists, 2 visitors and student workers, supported by 5 people providing technical assistance, 4 program managers and officers, and one personal assistant. Until now, 30 PhD students and 64 postdocs/research scientists have graduated from the lab. See below for the list of alumni!

You can click on any person to see who overlapped with them during their time in the Bork group.

Peer Bork, PhD
Interim Director General

Joined Jan 1994

Sina-Victoria Barysch, PhD
Project Manager

Also part of the Director's Office
Joined Jan 2020

Josipa Bilic Zimmermann, PhD
Planetary Biology Program Manager

Joined Sep 2020

Anthony Noel Fullam, PhD
Senior Bioinformatics Software Engineer

Joined May 2019

Anastasia Grekova, MSc
PhD Student

Joined Aug 2023

Mariam Hassan
Metadata Curator, Master Student

Joined Sep 2022

Anandhi Iyappan, PhD
Data & Metadata Standards Officer

Joined Apr 2021

Caroline Juery, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Apr 2025

Chan Yeong Kim, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Mar 2022

Michael Kuhn, PhD
Research Staff Scientist & Research Coordinator

Joined May 2016

Santiago Lago, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow (ARISE2)

Shared with the Stegle Group
Joined Oct 2024

Kerstin Leberecht, PhD
TREC Data Manager

Joined Apr 2023

Ivica Letunic, PhD
Visiting Scientist

Joined Oct 2014

Anna Mankowski, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Jan 2022

Federico Marotta, MSc
PhD Student

Joined May 2021

Marisol Navarro Miranda, MSc
PhD Student

Joined Apr 2025

Amandine Nunes-Jorge, MSc
BIOcean5D Project Manager

Joined Feb 2023

Daniel Podlesny, PhD
Research Scientist

Joined Apr 2022

Dennis Pohl, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Sep 2023

Shahriyar Mahdi Robbani, MSc
Bioinformatics Software Engineer

Joined Apr 2022

Felix Salim, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Mar 2025

Jonas Schiller, MSc
PhD Student

Joined Oct 2022

Christian Schudoma, PhD
Senior Bioinformatics Engineer

Joined Jul 2020

Kiley West Seitz, PhD
Soil Microbiologist

Joined Jun 2019

Suvi Turunen
Executive Assistant

Also part of the Director's Office
Joined Oct 2021

Lucas Ustick, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow

Joined Jul 2022

Yan P. Yuan, PhD
Bioinformatics Lab Manager

Joined Jan 1996

Alumni
Timeline

2020 to now

Marisa Isabell Keller (30th PhD student from Apr 2020 to May 2025) now Postdoctoral Fellow at Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research, Copenhagen
Santhust (Bioinformatician: Biological data and Network analysis from May 2022 to Apr 2025)
David Eckey (Master Student from Oct 2024 to Apr 2025)
Sarah Schulz (Microbiological Standards Officer from Mar 2022 to Feb 2025)
Matej Trojak (Planetary Biology Biocurator from Aug 2023 to Dec 2024)
Diënty Hendrina Maria Johanna Hazenbrink (Research Technician from Nov 2019 to Oct 2024)
Suguru Nishijima (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2019 to Sep 2024)
Enzo Faucher (Master Student from Mar 2024 to Aug 2024)
Tina Enders (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2023 to Aug 2024) now Environmental Samples Collection Manager at EMBL
Askarbek Orakov (Visitor from Jan 2019 to Sep 2019; 29th PhD student from Sep 2019 to Jun 2024) now Postdoctoral Fellow in the groups of Curtis Huttenhower and Hutlab and Seth Rakoff-Nahoum's (Harvard Chan Center for the Microbiome in Public Health / Boston Children's Hospital)
Claudia Sanchis Lopez (Visitor from Feb 2024 to Apr 2024)
Zhe Zhao (Visitor, Predoctoral Fellow from Mar 2021 to Dec 2023)
Anastasiia Kutkina (Master Student from May 2023 to Oct 2023)
Kasimir Noack (Metadata Curator from Sep 2022 to Sep 2023)
Supriya Khedkar (Postdoctoral Fellow from Nov 2017 to Aug 2023) now Research group leader at BioQuant, Heidelberg University
Moritz von Stetten (Metadata Curator, Master Student from Oct 2021 to Aug 2023)
Joseph Christian Somody (28th PhD student from Aug 2018 to May 2023)
Thomas Sebastian Schmidt (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Sep 2016 to Mar 2023) now Lecturer in Microbiome & Health at the APC Microbiome and School of Medicine, University College Cork, Ireland
Thea Van Rossum (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Nov 2017 to Oct 2022) now Senior Bioinformatician, Koonkie Inc
Alice Groudko (Visitor from Jan 2022 to Aug 2022) now Bachelor student in Edinburgh
Ela Cetin (Metadata Curator from Oct 2021 to Jul 2022)
Pamela Ferretti (27th PhD student from Sep 2017 to Jul 2022) now Postdoctoral Fellow in the lab of Ran Blekhman
Wasiu Akanni (Bioinformatics Software Engineer from Mar 2019 to Mar 2022) now Bioinformatician and Scientific Software Developer, German Human Genome-Phenome Archive
Leonie Thomas (Metadata Curator from Oct 2019 to Nov 2021)
Maria Zimmermann-Kogadeeva (Postdoctoral Fellow from Aug 2019 to Oct 2021) now Group Leader, Genome Biology Unit, EMBL
Bianca Maria Dibari (ARISE Program Manager from Oct 2020 to Oct 2021)
Daniela Chenkova (Personal Assistant from Oct 2014 to Oct 2021)
Sander Wuyts (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 2019 to Sep 2021) now CEO at ImmuneWatch, Antwerp, Belgium
Roman Thielemann (Metadata Curator, Master Student from Oct 2019 to Sep 2021) now PhD student at Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research
Sarela Garcia Santamarina (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from May 2018 to Sep 2021) now Research associate at ITQB-Nova, Oeiras, Portugal
Oleksandr Maistrenko (26th PhD student from Aug 2016 to Jul 2021) now Postdoctoral Fellow at NIOS, NL
Ece Kartal (Visitor from Jun 2015 to Jan 2016; 25th PhD student from Mar 2016 to Mar 2021) now Postdoctoral Fellow in Saez Lab at University Heidelberg
Alejandro Andres Murillo Cordova (Postdoctoral Fellow from Feb 2017 to Dec 2020) now Science communication coordinator - Project MACH-SATREPS Fisheries Development Institute - Chile
Stefanie Kandels (Scientific Operations Manager from Jan 2013 to Dec 2020) now Head of EMBL Heidelberg Director's Office
Ivan Kel (MD Student from Nov 2019 to Nov 2020) now Medical doctor
Tobias Wenzel (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2018 to Oct 2020) now Assistant Professor at Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
Christopher Lance (Visitor from Sep 2019 to Sep 2020) now PhD student at Helmholtz Zentrum München
Ulrike Trojahn (Project Manager from May 2018 to Jun 2020) now Administrator at Max-Planck-Institute of Biophysics
Renato Alves (24th PhD student from Sep 2015 to Jan 2020) now Bio-IT Project & Community Manager at EMBL

2015 to 2019

Yuanyue Li (Postdoctoral Fellow from Dec 2015 to Apr 2019) now Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Davis, Fiehn Lab
Natalie Romanov (23rd PhD student from Sep 2014 to Mar 2019) now Data Strategist at Merck Darmstadt
Lucas Moitinho e Silva (Postdoctoral Fellow from Feb 2017 to Feb 2019) now Scientist at University of Kiel, Poyet and Groussin labs
Pernille Myers (Visitor from Apr 2018 to Jan 2019) now Senior Bioinformatician at Clinical Microbiomics
Falk Hildebrand (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2014 to Jan 2019) now Research leader at Quadram Institute, Norwich, UK
Anna Maria Glazek (Senior Bioinformatics Officer from Nov 2016 to Nov 2018) now Software engineer at VEEVA Systems
Anna Schwarz (Visitor from Feb 2017 to Jun 2017 and from Mar 2018 to Aug 2018) now Consultant Data Science bei Five1 GmbH & Co. KG
Matthew Chaib (Visitor (Erasmus) from Sep 2017 to Jul 2018)
Jaime Huerta Cepas (Visitor from Jun 2013 to Jan 2014; Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2014 to Jul 2018) now Group leader at CBGP (UPM-INIA), Madrid, Spain
Luis Pedro Coelho (Postdoctoral Fellow from Apr 2013 to Jul 2018) now PI at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) in Brisbane
Anna Pryszlak (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2015 to May 2018) now Head of Screening at VERAXA Biotech GmbH
Mechthild Luetge (Visitor from Aug 2016 to Jul 2017 and from Sep 2017 to May 2018) now PhD student at Kantonsspital St Gallen
Sofia Forslund (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2012 to May 2018) now Group leader at MDC, Berlin
Katri Korpela (Visitor from Jan 2016 to Jan 2018) now Researcher at University of Helsinki
Esther Molina Montes (Visitor from Sep 2017 to Dec 2017)
Simone Li (21st PhD student from Aug 2012 to Nov 2017) now PI at Monash University, Melbourne
Melanie Tramontano/Schmid (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from Feb 2013 to Oct 2017) now Biosafety officer at DKFZ
Kristina Kastano (Visitor from Mar 2017 to Sep 2017) now PhD student at University of Mainz, CBDM
Marja Driessen (Postdoctoral Fellow from Feb 2014 to Sep 2017)
Benjamin Lang (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from May 2014 to Jul 2017) now Senior Bioinformatics Research Scientist in Madan Babu's Group at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
Matthew Hayward (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2014 to Jun 2017) now Postdoctoral Fellow at MGH, Harward
Robin Erich Muench (Visitor from Feb 2016 to Mar 2017)
Catarina Caroline de Sales e Santos Loureiro (Visitor from May 2016 to Nov 2016) now PhD student at University of Wageningen
Paul Igor Costea (22nd PhD student from Sep 2012 to Oct 2016) now Bioinformatician at BASF
Francis Kirigin (Visitor from Mar 2015 to Sep 2015 and from Apr 2016 to Aug 2016)
Shinichi Sunagawa (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Jun 2010 to Jul 2016) now Professor at ETH Zurich, Switzerland
Luca Parca (Visitor from Mar 2011 to Oct 2011; Scientist, staff member or postdoc from Jan 2013 to Jul 2016) now Researcher at Agenzia Spaziale Italiana
Mihaela Pruteanu (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from Jan 2014 to Jun 2016) now Science coordinatior and manager
Jessica Oberheim (PhD Student from Oct 2014 to Apr 2016)
Anita Yvonne Voigt (19th PhD student from Feb 2011 to Jan 2016) now Associate Research Scientist at The Jackson Laboratory, Farmington, CT
Jens Roat Kultima (18th PhD student from Jan 2011 to Jan 2016) now Danish Competition and Consumer Agency; Bioinformatics and Economic Fraud Specialist
Thomas K.C. Bock (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2012 to Jan 2016) now Proteomics LC-MS Specialist, Biozentrum Basel
Georg Zeller (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2010 to Dec 2015) now Associate Professor at the department of Parasitology at LUMC
Ana Zhu (17th PhD student from Jul 2010 to Aug 2015) now Postdoctoral Fellow at Sanger Institute, UK
Samy Deghou (20th PhD student from Oct 2011 to Aug 2015) now Software engineer at SAP
Pablo Minguez Paniagua (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 2009 to Jan 2015) now PI & Head of Bioinformatics Unit, Madrid, Spain
Clemens Lakner (Technical position from Nov 2012 to Jan 2015) now Investment professional

2010 to 2014

Nelly van der Jagt Gonzalez (Personal Assistant from Sep 1999 to Dec 2014) now Retired
Ivica Letunic (6th PhD student from Aug 2000 to Jul 2004; Research Staff Scientist from Jul 2004 to Oct 2014)
Tobias Doerks (3rd PhD student from Oct 1998 to Apr 2001; Research Staff Scientist from Jul 2003 to Sep 2014), Deceased
Daniel Mende (16th PhD student from May 2009 to May 2014) now Project Professor, Bio2Q, Keio University, Tokyo
Murat Iskar (15th PhD student from Jul 2008 to Apr 2014) now Postdoctoral Fellow at FMI, Switzerland
Tomas Larsson (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from Nov 2008 to Jan 2014) now Expert at NBIS, Uppsala University
Wei-Hua Chen (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jul 2008 to Jan 2014) now Professor at Huazhong University of Science and Technology
Sean Powell (Bioinformatician from Mar 2008 to Nov 2013) now Scientific Consultant at Genedata
Alison Waller (Scientist, staff member or postdoc from Oct 2009 to Oct 2013) now Working at Brock University
Vera van Noort (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Apr 2007 to Oct 2013) now Professor for Computational Systems Biology, KU Leuven
Merche Castillo (Visitor from Nov 2012 to Oct 2013)
Luz Garcia-Alonso (Visitor from Sep 2012 to Apr 2013) now Senior Bioinformatician at Wellcome Sanger Institute
Siegfried Schloissnig (Bioinformatician from Feb 2010 to Feb 2013) now Computer Scientist, IMP Vienna
Julien Tap (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2010 to Jan 2013) now Research scientist INRAE
Marc Sitges (Visitor from Jan 2012 to Aug 2012) now Product Owner at Sanofi Digital
Mani Arumugam (13th PhD student from Sep 2006 to Aug 2012) now Associate Professor, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen
Kalliopi Trachana (14th PhD student from Sep 2007 to Jul 2012) now Associate Director, Value Evidence Strategy, at Illumina
Damien Devos (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jul 2009 to May 2012) now PI at Centro Andaluz de Biologia del Desarrollo CABD
Takuji Yamada (Postdoctoral Fellow from Apr 2007 to Apr 2012) now Associate Prof. at Tokyo Institute of Technology
Xingming Zhao (Postdoctoral Fellow from May 2010 to Jan 2012) now Professor at Fudan University, Shanghai, China
Lucas Brouwers (Visitor from Jan 2010 to Aug 2010)
Gabriel Fernandes (Visitor from Jun 2009 to Apr 2010) now Researcher at Centro de Pesquisas Rene Rachou, Brasil
Monica Campillos (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 2003 to Jan 2010)

2005 to 2009

Jeroen Raes (Postdoctoral Fellow from May 2005 to Sep 2009) now Vice director, VIB Center for Microbiology
Jean Muller (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2007 to Sep 2009) now Assistant Professor at IGBMC & Faculte de Medicine, Universityof Strasbourg, France
Michael Kuhn (12th PhD student from Sep 2005 to Jul 2009) now Research Staff Scientist & Research Coordinator at EMBL
Damian Szklarczyk (Visitor from Oct 2008 to Apr 2009) now Research associate at Institute of Molecular Life Sciences, University of Zurich
Lars Juhl Jensen (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Jan 2003 to Feb 2009) now Professor & Group Leader at The Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research
Amoolya Singh (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2006 to Jan 2009) now SVP Data Science and CSO at GRAIL
Christopher Creevey (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 2005 to Jan 2009) now Professor of Computational Biology, Queen's University Belfast
Konrad Foerstner (11th PhD student from Sep 2004 to Dec 2008) now Professor at ZBMED & TH Köln
Florian Raible (Postdoctoral Fellow (EMBL Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowships) from Feb 2004 to Jul 2008) now Group Leader, Stem Cells, Regeneration and Developmental Plasticity, MFPL
Eoghan Harrington (10th PhD student from Sep 2003 to Mar 2008) now Applications Bioinformatician at Oxford Nanopore Technologies Ltd
Mikita Suyama (Postdoctoral Fellow from Apr 1999 to Apr 2007) now Professor at Research Center for Systems Immunology, Medical Institute of Bioregulation, Kyusu University
Sean Hooper (Postdoctoral Fellow from Oct 2003 to Feb 2007) now Data Platform Engineer at Altered Ltd
Michelle Chan (Visitor from May 2006 to Jan 2007)
Martin Lercher (Visitor from Sep 2004 to Oct 2006) now Professor at CEPLAS & Institute for Bioinformatics Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf
Samuel Chaffron (Visitor from Mar 2006 to Oct 2006) now Computational biologist at CNRS
Stephanie Boue (9th PhD student from Oct 2002 to Oct 2006)
Christian von Mering (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Sep 2001 to Aug 2006) now Professor at Department of Molecular Life Sciences, University of Zurich
David Torrents Arenales (Postdoctoral Fellow from Mar 2000 to Feb 2006) now Computational Genomics Group Manager, Barcelona Supercomputing Center
Parantu Shah (8th PhD student from Aug 2001 to Jan 2006) now Associate Scientific Director, EMD Serono R&D
Evgeny Zdobnov (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2002 to Nov 2005) now Professor Department of Genetic Medicine and Development, University of Geneva Medical School
Francesca D. Ciccarelli (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 2001 to Jul 2005) now Principal Group Leader at Crick Institute
Jan Korbel (7th PhD student from Mar 2001 to Apr 2005) now Head of Data Science & Group Leader in the Genome Biology Unit, EMBL, Heidelberg.
Roland Krause (Visitor from Jul 2004 to Mar 2005) now Research Scientist at Luxembourg Centre for Systems Biomedicine, University of Luxembourg
Markus Krupp (Visitor from Jul 2004 to Feb 2005) now Applications-Manager Signal Detection, Merck Group

2000 to 2004

Rossitza Ouzounova (Visitor from Jan 2004 to Oct 2004)
Julien Lagarde (Visitor from May 2003 to Feb 2004) now Head of Bioinformatics, Flomics Biotech
Mathilde Foglierini (Visitor from Oct 2002 to Nov 2003) now Computational immunologist
Caroline Perez-Iratxeta (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 2000 to Jun 2003)
Steffen Schmidt (5th PhD student from Jul 1999 to May 2003) now Staff Scientist at University of Bayreuth
Miguel Andrade (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jul 1998 to May 2003) now Professor at Universität Mainz
Warren C. Lathe III (Postdoctoral Fellow from Feb 1999 to Jan 2003) now Consultant
Shamil Sunyaev (Postdoctoral Fellow from May 1998 to Aug 2002) now Professor at Harvard Medical School
Richard Copley (Postdoctoral Fellow from Nov 1998 to Jun 2002) now Team Leader at Laboratoire de Biologie du developpement
Berend Snel (4th PhD student from Jan 1999 to May 2002) now Professor of Integrative Bioinformatics and Evolutionary Genomics Group, Utrecht University, NL
Birgit Eisenhaber (2nd PhD student from Oct 1997 to Jan 2002) now Senior Principal Investigator at Bioinformatics Institute, Singapore
Thomas Dandekar (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Apr 1997 to Jan 2002) now Chair of Bioinformatics, Biocenter, University of Würzburg
Martijn Huynen (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Nov 1996 to Sep 2001) now Professor at Radboud University Medical Centre, NL
Joerg Schultz (1st PhD student from Dec 1995 to Nov 2000) now Group Leader at the CCTB and Professor for Bioinformatics, Universität Würzburg
Enrique Morett (Visitor from Mar 1998 to Aug 1999 and from Jul 2000 to Sep 2000) now Investigador at Instituto de Biotechnologia, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico

1995 to 1999

Chris Ponting (Visitor from Jan 1997 to Mar 1997, from Sep 1997 to Oct 1997, from Dec 1997 to Jan 1998, from Feb 1998 to Mar 1998, and from Aug 1999 to Sep 1999) now Professor & Head for Biomedical Genomics, University of Edinburgh
Frank Eisenhaber (Postdoctoral Fellow from Jan 1997 to Sep 1999) now Senior Principal Investigator at Bioinformatics Institute, Singapore
Frank Milpetz (Programmer from Mar 1997 to Aug 1998)
Stefan Schuster (Postdoctoral Fellow & Research Staff Scientist from Sep 1997 to Jul 1998) now Professor at Faculty of Biology and Pharmacy, Department of Bioinformatics, University of Jena, Germany
Yudong Cai (Postdoctoral Fellow from Aug 1996 to Apr 1998) now Professor and PI at Institute of Systems Biology, Shanghai University
Yolande Diaz Lazcoz (Postdoctoral Fellow from Dec 1996 to Mar 1998) now Research Teacher at Laboratoire de Mathématiques et Modélisation d'Évry, Université d'Évry Val d'Essonne
Hedvig Hegyi (Postdoctoral Fellow from Oct 1995 to Oct 1997) now Group Leader of Masaryk University, CZ
Vladimir M. Morozov (Visitor from Aug 1996 to Apr 1997) now Researcher at Chemical Enzymology Division, Chemistry Department, Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia
Jianmei Lai (Postdoctoral Fellow from Feb 1996 to Feb 1997) now IT Infrastructure Services Technology Senior Consultant at SAP
Nigel Brown (Postdoctoral Fellow from Sep 1995 to Nov 1996) now CEITEC, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic
John Boyle (Postdoctoral Fellow from Aug 1994 to Sep 1995) now Head of Information Science at Owlstone Medical