Marino received his PhD in 1982 from the University of Trieste in Italy. His journey then took him from Paris to EMBL Heidelberg before becoming one of the founding fathers of the MPI-CBG in Dresden in 1998. During his successful career, Marino and his group have dedicated countless hours to the mechanisms that govern intracellular trafficking; work that was recognized with the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize by the German Research Foundation (DFG) in 2006. In 2023, he took a position as Director of the Human Technopole Institute in Milan and holds a double - affiliation. For more information and a detailed CV, please visit Marino´s profile on the institute´s website.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.

Ilaria is the lab technician in the tissue culture room, always ready to help with cell lines, primary cells, organoids, and liver tissue. If you’re looking for her, she’s probably moving between labs rather than sitting at her desk. Outside work, she enjoys staying active through sports and exploring new places, especially in nature.
Portrait copyright: HT

What looks messy to others may look perfectly ordered to this Chilean. José is obsessed with understanding the hidden order inside the disorder.
Developing a multi-lineage cell culture system, José dreams of unraveling how liver cells navigate through the mess and self-organize into functional structures. It’s all about keeping good communication, he says. Where there is mess, there is beauty!

Portrait copyright: HT.

Lidan is passionate about understanding complex cellular structures and how cells sense mechanical forces. Usually found at the microscopy facility rather than at her desk, she investigates the hidden details of cell biology using advanced microscopes. She completed her PhD at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, where her interest in mechanobiology flourished. In her free time, she enjoys walking and hiking — though actin organization is never too far from her thoughts.
Portrait copyright: HT.

Originally exploring the world of plant molecular biology at the University of Milan, Marta now spends her PhD years investigating tissue organization and cell communication in the liver. Outside of the lab, she enjoys being in nature, playing volleyball, and spending time with friends over good food and long conversations.
Portrait copyright: HT.

From the snowy steppes of Kazakhstan to sunny Italy, Zhansaya followed her fascination with membrane trafficking into the world of early endosomes. Combining approaches from cell biology and biochemistry, she investigates how endosomal proteins orchestrate their spatially and temporally regulated molecular choreography. Outside the lab, she enjoys exploring Italian lakes and seas, trading membrane trafficking for boat trafficking.
Portrait copyright: HT.

Don't panic! As the director's assistant for many years, Sandy is the interface between science and administration. She keeps track of everything that is going on, supports the group members and also has a piece of advice at hand when needed. Furthermore, Sandy has gained a lot of experience in event management and knows what matters.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.

Build Break Breakthrough! Anupam enjoys learning about living systems and is always open for discussions. Interested in time-scales and all other scales.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.

I got new livers! Scientifically (and non-scientifically) raised on the interdisciplinary campus in Tübingen, she couldn’t resist the spirit of MPI-CBG and is now doing the splits between basic science and translational medicine. By studying liver structure and function in health and disease, she’s aiming to answer key questions in understanding basic cell biology and pathophysiology.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.

Alice feels most at home in the areas of nanomedicine and drug delivery. As an Italian Biologist, she moved to the University of Manchester in the UK to obtain a Ph.D. where she discovered her love for cell biology and drug delivery. She joined the lab to continue her studies on intracellular trafficking, in particular on the endosomal escape process, which represents the bottleneck hindering the efficient delivery of RNA therapeutics. When she is not playing with nanoparticles, she is probably singing with her band or riding her mountain bike in the countryside.

How do living things work? Matt uses tools from physics and math to make models which encapsulate our ideas about what’s going on. He grew up in Arizona, USA and did his PhD at UC Irvine in Southern California. In the lab, he is currently working on understanding the mechanics of bile canaliculi.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.

As a real veteran, Ramona is the go-to person for all questions around biochemical assays in the lab. She manages all organizational needs in the lab from ordering to stock solutions and is an expert in biochemical in vitro assays. Apart from that, she is also insanely cool - she rides a motorcycle.
Portrait copyright: MPI-CBG.