After studying veterinary medicine, Anja began her scientific work at the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut (FLI, Island of Riems, Germany) by focusing on neurodegenerative diseases or more precisely on prion diseases. She obtained her doctorate for the examination of eukaryotic cell lines with regards to their susceptibility to different prion strains and continued, as a postdoc, to investigate the so called ‘prion strain phenomenon’ at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI, Florida, USA). During that time, she developed a strong interest for cognitive neuroscience and seized an opportunity to study learning, memory & forgetting in D. melanogaster for a year, before coming to the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology (LIN, Magdeburg, Germany) several years ago, to investigate neural brain activity patterns in rodents employing small-animal in vivo single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) brain imaging. With a particular interest in sleep promoted memory consolidation, Anja joined NPlast in March 2020 to complement the group’s work on the molecular mechanisms of synapse-to-nucleus communication and synaptic plasticity with in vivo electrophysiological recordings in freely behaving mice.

Anna is originally from Russia. She did her Diploma studies at the Bashkir State University in Ufa with the majors in Biology and Chemistry. She then obtained a Ph.D. degree in Neuroscience in a joined project between the Bashkir State University and the Lomonosov State University in Moscow, Russia. Her thesis work dealt with the anatomy and neurophysiology of amygdalar circuitry. She joined NPlast in 2008 as a research associate and started to work on the characterization of Jacob. She is now a Co-PI with Michael on projects related to synapse-to-nucleus communication.

Eleonora is originally from Cagliari, Italy. She did her Single Cycle Degree in Pharmacy. After that she joined first the Neuro-Pharmacology laboratory of The Biomedical Research Center of Barcelona and then the Neurophysiology laboratory at the University of Malta. Since January 2019 she is part of the Nplast group and is enrolled in the SynAge program. She will work on a project dealing with the Molecular underpinning of high-risk aging, neuronal insulin signaling, amyloidosis and the metabolic syndrome.

Rose is from Hamburg, Germany. She is receiving training as a technical assistant in Hamburg. She has joined the AG Kreutz at the ZMNH for a 4-month Internship.

Ahmed is originally from Egypt. He did his bachelor degree in Biophysics with an honourable excellent degree from faculty of science – Ain shams university – Cairo – Egypt (2017). Then he joined Santiago Canals lab in instituto de neurociencias – UMH – Alicante – Spain (2019) where he obtained his master degree in neuroscience. During his master he recorded calcium signals from Dentate Gyrus Parvalbumin interneurons during memory formation using Two-Photon microscopy. Now, he is a PhD student on the LIN Special Project “Autophagy meets Sleep” with Anna Karpova and Matthias Prigge.

Mark is from Eschweiler, Germany. He started to study medicine in 2017 at the Otto-von-Guericke-University in Magdeburg, Germany. In October he joined NPlast to work on his MD thesis as part of the SynAge graduate program. He works on a screening of plant-extracts and their property on inhibiting the cellular uptake of pyroglutaminated Aβ oligomers.

Marit is from Kiel, Germany. She obtained her bachelor's degree in Biowissenschaften at the University of Osnabrück. For her master studies, she moved to Hamburg where she was enrolled in the Biology M.Sc. program at the University of Hamburg. She joined the Hamburg team at the ZMNH for her master thesis. Now she is a PhD student working together with Kasia on dendritic organelles and protein degradation in the context of neurodegenerative diseases.

Maru was born in Pamplona, Spain. She obtained her degree in Biology at the University of Navarre, Pamplona, Spain (2010). She performed her master studies in Neuroscience at University College London, UK (2010-2012). She performed her Ph.D. studies at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology under the supervision of Dr.Anna Fejtova and Dr. Eckart Gundelfinger within a Marie Curie ITN programme coordinated by Dr. Michael Kreutz. She is currently working as a post-doctoral researcher at the Center for Molecular Neurobiology Hamburg.

Helene is from Gommern that is close to Magdeburg. She started studying medicine at the Otto-von-Guericke University in Magdeburg in 2016. In October 2019 she joined NPlast to work on her MD thesis. She is working on a project that deals with the screening of different plant extracts and deciphering their anti-inflammatory effects using cell culture approach as a model of the neuroinflammatory status in Alzheimer’s Diseas. She is employed as part of the SynAge graduate program.

Mohamed was born in Tunisia. After completion of his higher education in his home country he moved to France. He did his master studies on Structural and Molecular Biology (2007-2009) and Molecular and Cellular Pathophysiology at the University of Strasbourg, France. There he also performed his Ph.D. work in the research group Intracellular membrane trafficking in the nervous system (Institut des Neurosciences Cellulaires et Intégratives,University of Strasbourg, 2010-2013). Subsequently he worked as a research fellow in the Division of Molecular Genetics and Cell Biology at the School of Biological Sciences, NTU-Singapore (2013-2014). In 2015, he joined NPlast as a post-doctoral researcher. He is working on two projects on long-distance signaling in neurons and is involved in the characterization of Prr7.

Irene is originally from Valladolid (Spain). She obtained her bachelor degree in Biotechnolohy at Universidad de León (Spain) in 2012, and then she did her Masters degree in Valencia on Molecular Approaches in Health Sciences (2013). At the same time, she worked on enzymopathologies at Instituto de Biomedicina de Valencia IBV-CSIC, in the lab of Prof. Vicente Rubio. She then performed her Ph.D. in Biomedicine (2018) at Universidad de Barcelona, under the supervision of Prof. Rafael Franco, where she worked on GPCRs, specifically on cannabinoid receptor heteromers and their potential as therapeutic targets for neurodegenerative diseases. During her Ph.D. she had an internship at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, at Prof. Kjell Fuxe’s group. She joined NPlast as a post-doctoral researcher in January 2019, to work in the project dealing with synapse-nucleus signaling of protein messengers.

Max is from Hamburg, Germany. He studied life sciences at the University of Rostock and obtained his M.Sc. degree in Biology, with a specialization in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, from the University of Hamburg in 2016. In the beginning of 2017 he joined DOF in Hamburg to perform his Ph.D. studies. He will study satellite Golgi-containing microsecretory systems in dendrites and test how they enable local glycosylation of proteins that can then be recruited to membranes in spatially confined dendritic segments.

PingAn is from Shanghai, China. She studied Neurobiology at the Fudan University in Shanghai and completed her Ph.D. training in 2012. Since 2013 she works in Nplast at the LIN. Her expertise covers different types of electrophysiological recordings that she combines with cell biological techniques. Her main interest is related to molecular mechanisms of synaptic plasticity.

Guilherme is from Anápolis, Brazil. He obtained his M.Sc. degree in Toxicological Biochemistry from the Federal University of Santa Maria, Santa Maria, Brazil. He performed his Ph.D. studies on NMDA receptor signaling and Alzheimer Disease in the same University.He found that polyamines, positive modulators of NMDA receptor,are involved in the amyloid beta induced cognitive impairment. He joined NPLAST first in 2012 for one year Ph.D. internship, and later in 2014 as a Alexander von Humboldt post-doctoral research fellow. He tries to answer the question on how the brain forms new independent memories, and what are the mechanisms undermining its function in neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorder.

Kasia is from Warsaw, Poland. She received a Bachelor and a Master of science degree in Biotechnology from Warsw University of Life Sciences. During her bachelor studies she spend one semester at Ghent University, Belgium with an Erasmus fellowship. She joined NPlast as a PhD student in 2012 where she was part of the Marie-Curie ITN NPlast (www.nplast.de) that was coordinated by Michael. Kasia is a Molecular Cell Biologist and her main interest is to learn about principles of neuronal cell biology that are relevant for neuronal diseases. Following completion of her thesis work she joined the Hamburg team and started a project on dendritic organelles and protein degradation in the context of multiple sclerosis.

Jakob is from Gummersbach, Germany. He obtained his Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Biological Sciences at the University of Cologne. During his Master’s thesis at the LMB in Cambridge, he worked on the regulation and specificity of protein phosphatases. For his Ph.D., Jakob aims to master light imaging techniques to understand how the Golgi-microsecretory systems in dendrites facilitate synaptic function and plasticity.

Rajeev is originally from Ranchi, Jharkhand, India. He obtained his B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Biotechnology from Ranchi University and Visva-Bharati. He performed his Ph.D. studies at the Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad, India. Since January 2016, he is working as a post-doctoral researcher in NPlast. Rajeev contributes to our work with a lot of experience and competence in protein biochemistry.

Coming soon

Sebastian was born in Eschweiler, Germany. He obtained his bachelor degree in Biotechnology from the University of Aachen.For his master studies he enrolled in the Cellular and Molecular Neurosciences program at the University of Tübingen. He joined NPlast as a PhD student in February 2017 where he works on protein trafficking in neurons and applies a plethora of different techniques.

Michael is originally from Austria. He studied Chemistry and obtained his M.Sc. degree from the Leopold-Franzens-University of Innsbruck, Tyrol, Austria. In May 2017, he joined the Hamburg team where he currently works on a collaborative with the lab of Marina Mikhaylova. His major interest is in characterization of the molecular dynamics of the postsynapse where he uses a broad portfolio of different techniques including nanobody technology.

Eckart is originally from Swabia. He headed the Neurochemistry Department at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology (LIN) and was Professor at the Otto von Guericke University, Magdeburg until December 2020. Eckart studied Biology in Stuttgart, performed doctoral research at the MPI for Biology in Tübingen and was postdoc at the EMBL in Heidelberg. In 1984, he joined the Betz laboratory at the Center for Molecular Biology Heidelberg (ZMBH) and from 1988-1993 he headed a BMFT/BMBF-funded research group at the Center for Molecular Neurobiology, Hamburg (ZMNH). In 1992 he accepted the department head position at the LIN and from 2010-2019 he was managing scientific director of the institute. In 2021 Eckart retired as a professor and joined NPlast as a guest scientist. His research is centered around the molecular structure and plasticity of brain synapses with main focus on the molecular organization of the active zone of neurotransmitter release.

Carolina is from Temuco-Chile. She studied Biochemistry at the Austral University in Valdivia. She performed her Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology and Neuroscience at the Chile University in Santiago-Chile and Severo Ochoa Institute in Madrid-Spain. Carolina joined the Eckarts Gundelfinger group in 2011 as a postdoctoral researcher. She started to work in the presynaptic protein Bassoon and its role in modulating neurotransmitter release and synaptic plasticity. Recently she obtained a CBBS-LSA fellowship (2020-2021) to work on a project related to Bassoon´s role in the generation of tauopathies and the regulation of presynaptic proteostasis. In January 2021 she joined Nplast as a guest scientist.

Gonca is from Turkey. She studied Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Istanbul Technical University and the University of Heidelberg, Germany. She obtained her M.Sc. degree from the University of Tübingen, Germany, where she was part of the Graduate School of Cellular and Molecular Neurosciences. In her thesis, she characterized novel probes for ex vivo and in vivo optical Imaging of protein aggregates in mouse models of Alzheimer’s Disease. Gonca joined NPlast in 2012 with a thesis project on 'Molecular mechanisms for the synaptic control of neuronal DNA-methylation', which she defended in 2017. She went on to pursue her post-doctoral research on neurodegenerative diseases at the University of Cambridge. She is part of NPlast as a guest scientist for the completion of the projects.

Christina studied Biology (Diploma) at the University of Bielefeld. She obtained her Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, Magdeburg, Department Neurochemistry and Molecular Biology under the supervision of Eckart Gundelfinger and Karl-Heinz Braunewell. She then moved to the Neuroscience Research Center of the Charite, and worked as a PostDoc in the Signal Transduction Research Group at the Humboldt-University, Berlin (2001-2002 / PI Karl-Heinz Braunewell) and later on the Institute for Anatomy, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster,Research Group ‘Molecular Neurobiology’ (PI Tobias M. Böckers, 2002 - 2004).

Thomas is from Germany. He obtained his Ph.D. degree at the Institute of Biochemistry, Freie University Berlin, Germany. From 1994 to 2007 he was working at the Leibniz Institute for Neurobiology, (Magdeburg, Germany) and at the Laboratory for Neuronal Circuit Dynamics, (BSI-Riken, Japan) as a guest scientist. Since 2007 Thomas is a Principal Investigator at the Institutes of Brain Science and State Key Laboratory of Medical Neurobiology, Fudan University, Shanghai. His research focuses on the cellular mechanisms underlying memory formation, emphasizing the role of activity-dependent protein synthesis and ubiquitin proteasome-dependent protein degradation in hippocampal synaptic plasticity.

Isabel is from Zschopau. She obtained her Bachelor’s degree in “Biotechnologie” at the University of Applied Science in Zittau and did her master studies at the Friedrich-Schiller-University in Jena. For her Master thesis she came to the LIN and worked in the department of Neurochemistry. She is now working for Nplast as a technical assistant.

Moni is originally from Oschersleben, which is close to Magdeburg.She finished nursing school and she also holds an engineer degree in agriculture and animal breeding. She is with Michael since the beginning of NPlast and apart from many other skills she is a magician in preparing neuronal primary cultures. There is essentially no paper of NPlast where Moni hasn't contributed.

Corinna is from Magdeburg, Germany, where she also received training as a technical assistant. She joined Michael's group at the LIN in 1998 and is invaluable for NPlast because of more than 20 years of experience in cell culture and protein biochemistry.