Marcus Thelen PhD

Dr. Marcus Thelen studied biochemistry at the University of Tübingen (DE) and received his PhD from the University of Bern. He then moved to the Theodor-Kocher-Institute in Bern where his interests focused on inflammation and chemokines. In 1989, he went to the Rockefeller University in New York, joining the group of Alan Aderem in the Laboratory of Cellular Physiology and Immunology of the Cohn/Steinman department. Biochemical aspects of cyotokine- and endotoxin-mediated phagocyte priming and cytoskeleton-mediated signal transduction were the topics of his studies. In 1992, he received a career development award (START) from the Swiss National Science Foundation and returned to the Theodor-Kocher-Institute at the University of Bern. He created his own research group working on molecular mechanisms of signal transduction in leukocytes, focusing on PI 3-kinase-dependent pathways and chemokine-mediated receptor activation. He obtained the venia docendi in 1994 and was awarded an honorary professorship in 2001 from the University of Bern. In 2000, he moved to Bellinzona and assisted in the opening of the IRB. Marcus Thelen heads since then the Laboratory of Signal Transduction.