Born 1963 in Den Helder, Netherlands. Study of biochemistry at the University of Wageningen, the University of Georgia/USA and the University of Illinois/USA, master degree in engineering in molecular sciences, University of Wageningen (1988), PhD in biochemistry University of Wageningen (1992), research fellow of the Royal Durch Academy of Sciences at the University of Wageningen (1992-1993), postdoc with Thomas Jovin, MPI for Biophysical Chemistry (1993-1996), group leader at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (1997-2000), group leader at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg (2000-2006), Director and Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Physiology (since 2006).