News

December 2024: As a member of the Young Academy of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, Kilian had the opportunity to host a workshop with some of the best T cell immunologists from the region in the spectacular location of the Academy. Almost the whole lab attended, and Evi and Michael chaired two sessions.

November 2024: Kilian is appointed Heisenberg professor for T cell immunology! And the team congratulates him in exactly the way Kilian loves them for.

September 2024: Kilian receives the Life Science Bridge Award by the Aventis Foundation. What an honor! The award carries 100.000 € and is thereby one of the highest endowed prizes for young researchers in Germany. Awards go to single persons, but the work is done by the team. The foundation did a great job in honoring all three awardees with a great ceremony in Frankfurt, but also with very detailed written portraits, which you find here.

September 2024: Our lab welcomes a new member: Say hello to Lucia Klotz (left picture) who will support our team as a technician. We are very happy to have found you, Lucia!

At the same time, we are sad to let Christine Schülein (right picture) go. Christine was our lab's first technician. Her contributions in our first years were invaluable. Thank you so much, Christine, and all the best to you!

Find out more about our team here.

March 2024: Yellow fever, dengue fever, tick-borne encephalitis, Japanese encephalitis and other infectious diseases, are triggered by pathogens from the flavivirus family. A very effective vaccine is available for yellow fever. The protection provided by vaccines against dengue fever, tick-borne encephalitis and Japanese encephalitis is much weaker and no vaccines are available at all for other flaviviruses. Together with 12 international partners within the context of the EU Horizon initiative our lab will investigate the secret behind the success of the yellow fever vaccine, and whether it can be transferred to other infections triggered by flaviviruses. The FAU researchers have received 727,000 euros in funding. For more information, see the FAU press release or the YELLOW4FLAVI website.

March 2024: Ever wondered what would happen if you get vaccinated against the same antigen over and over again? In "The Lancet Infectious Diseases", we here report on a hypervaccinated individual from Magdeburg (HIM) who received 217 vaccinations within 29 months against SARS-CoV-2. Shared first-authorships by Katharina and Caro, and shared last-authorships by Evi and Kilian. One for the team!

February 2024: The lab welcomes new postdocs! Myriam ("Mimi") did her PhD in molecular parasitology at FAU and will work on flavivirus-induced T cell immunity. Michael studied the role of CD4 T cells in CNS autoimmunity for his PhD at TU Munich, and investigated tumor neo-epitopes at the DKFZ during a first postdoctoral fellowship. He will continue working on this topic in our lab. Learn more about Mimi and Michael here.

September 2023: Wow, Strasbourg is a beautiful city. Almost the entire team was there for the joint conference of the German and French societies of Immunology. Kilian was very proud about both the poster presentation as well as the dancing capabilities of everyone.

August 2023: We had so much fun at our joint lab retreat together with the groups of Veit Buchholz (Munich) and Martin Väth (Würzburg) in the beautiful monastery of Plankstetten. The perfect setting for exciting science, culture and some drinks. We look forward to repeating this in the future!

April 2023: We are visited by Antonino Cassotta from Federica Sallusto's lab this week and took the opportunity for a night out with (most of) the lab. We were in the Steinbach brewery, where beer is being produced since the 17th century. Antonino even dared to try the Franconian "Schäufele".

March 2023: The lab welcomes two new students. Julia studied Molecular Medicine in Freiburg and Innsbruck and joins us for her PhD. Abel is a medical doctor from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and is doing his MSc at FAU with a DAAD "leadership for Africa" scholarship. In their first weeks, the two have already left excellent impressions and we are very happy to have them on board. Learn more about Julia and Abel and the rest of the team here.

February 2023: At our belated lab Xmas meeting (please admire Caro's "Secret Santa" gift, a bottle opener in the form of a T cell receptor meeting an antigen), we say goodbye to Rutuja, who will start a PhD in immune cell engineering in Dresden. Rutuja, you have impressed us all with your incredible personality. All the best to you!

July 2022: Kilian receives the GSK foundation science award in the category "clinical research" for his work on reverse T cell repertoire evolution during CMV infection. What an honor!

April 2022: Anna, Niclas and Sina are supporting the lab's team as interns. Anna is with us for 8 months in-between her MSc degree and her PhD. Niclas did a 2-month internship before starting Med School. Sina joins from Regensburg to do her MSc thesis with us.

December 2021: The Schober Lab celebrates the closure of its first year with a small Christmas party (all lab members freshly triple vaccinated and tested the same morning). Evi wins the first Christmas Lab Quiz - a kind of pub quiz with blind picking of prices donated by everyone (Wichteln style) - everyone agrees this likely marks the start of a long lab tradition. What a year this has been with this fantastic team. We can't wait for 2022!

October 2021: Kilian receives the Robert Koch Postdoc award by the Robert Koch Foundation in immunology. What an honour and time to be thankful! Learn more about the prizes and this year's awardees here.