Born 1957 in Glonn near Munich. Study of Biology in Frankfurt/Main and Tübingen, PhD in Tübingen (MPI) and EMBL Heidelberg (1983), postdoc Department of Genetics Cambridge (UK) (1983-1985), postdoc MPI für Entwicklungsbiologie Tübingen (1985-1988), Habilitation in Molecular biology Tübingen (1988), Group leader Department of Genetics München Univ. (1988-1990), Professor for molecular evolution Department of Zoology München Univ. (1991-1998), Professor for molecular evolution Institut für Genetik Köln Univ. (1998-2007), Director at Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology (since 2007).