About us


At the Institute of Biophysics, we are looking at the dynamics and mechano-chemical function of individual molecules and their interactions and transport processes inside of living cells with the aim of increasing the mechanistic understanding of important biological processes including gene expression, DNA repair and chromatin organization.

For this task, we are developing novel methodologies in an interdisciplinary approach between Physics, Biology and Data Sciences, including single-molecule FRET, single-molecule microscopy in living cells, super-resolution optical microscopy and single-molecule force spectroscopy. In addition, we are developing data analysis methods to foster a quantitative understanding of biological processes.  

 

Leitung/Director:

Prof. Dr. Jens Michaelis
Prof. Dr. Christof Gebhardt

 

News

August 2024
Congratulations on successfully defended doctoral thesis
to Christian Ganslmayer!

Publication December 2023
Duyen Huynh, Philipp Hoffmeister, Tobias Friedrich, Kefan Zhang, Marek Bartkuhn, Francesca Ferrante, Benedetto Daniele Giaimo, Rhett Kovall, Tilman Borggrefe, Franz Oswald, J. Christof M. Gebhardt
In vivo binding free energy landscape reveals kinetic control of transcription factor function
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2023.12.19.572376v1

 

 

Publication December 2023
Jonas Coßmann, Pavel I. Kos, Vassiliki Varamogianni-Mamatsi, Devin Assenheimer, Tobias Bischof, Timo Kuhn, Thomas Vomhof, Argyris Papantonis, Luca Giorgetti, J. Christof M. Gebhardt
Increasingly efficient chromatin binding of cohesin and CTCF supports chromatin architecture formation during zebrafish embryogenesis

Publication November 2023
Fanny Wondany, Jens Michaelis and further international authors
ARF1 prevents aberrant type I interferon induction by regulating STING activation and recycling
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-42150-4

July 2023
Congratulations on successfully defended doctoral thesis
to Nicole Malkusch!

Publication June 2023
Florian Olde Heuvel, Najwa Ouali Alami, Oumayma Aousji, Esther Pogatzki-Zahn, Peter K. Zahn, Hanna Wilhelm, Dhruva Deshpande, Elmira Khatamsaz, Alberto Catanese, Sarah Woelfle, Michael Schön, Sanjay Jain, Stefanie Grabrucker, Albert C. Ludolph, Chiara Verpelli, Jens Michaelis, Tobias M. Boeckers and Francesco Roselli
Shank2 identifies a subset of glycinergic
neurons involved in altered nociception
in an autism model

https://doi.org/10.1186/s13229-023-00552-7

June 2023
Congratulations on successfully defended doctoral thesis to Anna Sefer!

Publication June 2023
Sebastian Heber, Joscha Borho, Nicole Stadler, Fanny Wondany, Irina König, Jens Michaelis, Panagiotis Papatheodorou, Holger Barth and Maximilian Fellermann
The Clostridium botulinum C2 Toxin Subunit C2IIa Delivers Enzymes with Positively Charged N-Termini into the Cytosol of Target Cells
https://doi.org/10.3390/toxins15060390

Publication March 2023
Anna Sefer and Jens Michaelis
participated in an international initiative, now published:

Reliability and accuracy of single-molecule FRET studies for characterization of structural dynamics and distances in proteins
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41592-023-01807-0

Publication January 2023
Christof M. Gebhardt and IRF4 International Consortium authors and contributions
A multimorphic mutation in IRF4 causes human autosomal dominant combined immunodeficiency
https://doi.org/10.1126/sciimmunol.ade7953

January 2023
Congratulations on successfully defended doctoral thesis to Anja Reisser!