In a festive ceremony embedded in Goethe University’s Postdoctoral Day, IBC2 group leader Christian Münch today received the Aventis Foundation Postdoctoral Award.
The award is endowed with € 100,000 and intended to support young academics on their track towards full professorships. Each year, the Aventis Foundation cooperates with a scientific institution to honour up to three of the most outstanding talents in life sciences. This year, besides Christian, two colleagues working at Goethe University’s Riedberg campus have been selected, Daniel Merk and Inga Hänelt.

Christian started his Emmy Noether group at IBC2 three years ago after returning from Harvard Medical School to Germany. He has been extremely successful in securing independent funding, e.g. holds one of the prestigious ERC starting grants.

His group aims at better understanding the molecular mechanisms driving mitochondrial quality control. Despite being fully devoted to basic science, Christian’s research has direct relevance to common neurodegenerative diseases.

Pictures taken by Uwe Dettmar.