Silvia and Jan-Daniele join the lab as Master’s student for the next 6 months to work on mouse and human intestinal organoids, respectively. Enjoy your stay!
5 year anniversary
Today we celebrate the 5th year anniversary of the Liberali lab with flowers and champagne!
Qiutan's paper on bioRxiv
Qiutan’s exciting story on how differences in osmotic forces combined with changes of myosin patterns drive robust intestinal crypt morphogenesis was published on bioRxiv. Congrats!
Cell scientist to watch
You want to learn more about Prisca, what drives and motivates her? Then read this inspiring interview with a ‘cell scientist to watch’.
Conny joins the lab
Conny joins the lab as a PostDoc. We wish you all the best for your exciting project and are looking forward to working with you!
Maurice starts in the lab
Maurice joins the lab for his PhD. We are looking forward to work on exciting projects with you in the upcoming years!
Shicong visits the lab
Shicong Xie, a postdoc from Jan Skotheim’s lab at the University of Stanford, joins the lab for a two months visit. She studies the cell cycle and plans to test her findings in intestinal organoids using our lightsheet microscope.
Simon joins the lab
Simon joins the lab as a Master student for 11 months. He studies molecular biotechnology at the University of Applied Sciences, FH Campus Vienna, Austria and will work on symmetry breaking in gastruloids.
Nicole and Koen start in the lab
With the new year our lab also welcomes two new members. Nicole Repina who did her PhD at UC Berkeley in the lab of David Schaffer and Koen Oost who did his PhD at the Netherlands Cancer Institute in the lab of Hugo Snippert both started their PostDoc. Their start coincides with Epiphany where Swiss traditionally eat the ‘Dreikönigskuchen’ - a ring of sweet bread buns with a little plastic king hidden in one of them. The person finding the king in their bun gets to wear a golden paper crown - and both Nicole and Koen were the lucky ones. We welcome our new queen and king to the lab and wish them all the best for their projects!
Urs defends his PhD and leaves FMI
Our year concludes with Urs’ PhD defense. Urs - who started his PhD in 2016 - first presented his PhD project in front of family, friends and colleagues and afterwards was examined by Prisca, Susan Gasser, Luca Giorgetti, Darren Gilmore and Marc Bühler. He received a ‘Summa cum laude’ for his outstanding performance. His hat was decorated with a confetti-throwing volcano that depicted the hurdles of a PhD. This also marked the end of Urs’ time at FMI. The group will miss him and wishes him all the best for his future!
Denise leaves FMI
Today marked the last day of Denise, the first student finishing her PhD and leaving the Liberali lab. We celebrated our time together over lunch and Italian pastries. After a well deserved holiday, Denise will join Kim Jensen’s lab at BRIC, Copenhagen, Denmark, in January for her PostDoc work. We wish her all the best for her future endeavours and will miss her dearly!
Prisca becomes an EMBO Young Investigator
Congratulations to Prisca who was selected to become an EMBO Young Investigator. In this program, EMBO chooses several researchers under the age of 40 who are within their first four years as group leaders and have a proven record of scientific excellence to provide both financial and practical support to help them develop skills and connections.
Ilya joins FAIM
Today, Ilya joins FAIM, the FMI imaging facility, 50% as high content screening expert while staying in the lab 50%. Congratulation to this import step!
Ilya's PhD defense
Our week of celebrations continues with Ilya’s PhD defense. Ilya - who started as Prisca’s first PhD student in August 2015 - first presented his PhD project in front of family, friends and colleagues and afterwards was examined by Prisca, Jörg Betschinger, Matthias Lutolf and Nancy Hynes. He received a ‘Summa cum laude’ for his outstanding performance. The lab prepared a hat incorporating his love for mountains and technical details in form of a revolving imaging plate. The day ended with Ilya’s greatest passion - enjoying good beer!
Denise's PhD defense
Today was a special day for the lab as Denise defended her PhD thesis as the first student of the lab. Denise - who started her PhD in November 2015 shortly after the lab was established - first gave a presentation of her PhD project in front of family, friends and colleagues and afterwards was examined by Prisca, Dirk Schübeler, Anne Grapin-Botton and Filippo Rijli. Her excellent performance was honoured with ‘Summa cum laude’ and an extensively decorated PhD hat. This exciting day ended with celebrations among friends and colleagues.
FMI Annual Meeting 2019
This year’s FMI Annual Meeting took us to Grindelwald, Switzerland. The program was filled with exciting talks from our colleagues, including one from Qiutan, and the keynote speaker, Sir Adrian Bird from the Welcome Centre of Cell Biology, Edinburgh, UK. Traditionally, we also enjoyed scenic hikes in the Swiss Mountains and a Gala dinner with the infamous follies with a contribution of Prisca.
Clara started her PhD
Today was Clara’s first day as PhD student in the Liberali lab. We are happy to welcome her in our group and wish her all the best for her PhD!
Lab dinner
The hot summer temperatures did not stop us - including the former lab members Aline, Andrea and Petr - to gather, spend a wonderful summer evening in Basel’s city centre and again celebrate Denise’s, Urs’ and Andrea’s paper and prize.
Stuck in the elevator
An elevator ride to our long-awaited lunch break came to a sudden stop as the elevator got stuck on the 4th floor. We all took it with humour as the Novartis fire brigade worked on freeing as while FMI’s group leader Georg Keller entertained our small group from the outside.
Lab retreat in Barcelona
From May 27-29, we spent our annual lab retreat in Barcelona. Besides enjoying the sea, Barcelona’s beautiful architecture, delicious food and impressive Sagrada Familia, we also met with the labs of Miki Ebisuya, James Sharpe and Vikas Trivedia (EMBL) to discuss tissue formation and self-organisation as well as with the lab of Xavier Trepat (IBEC) to discuss tissue mechanics. We returned with our skin lightly tanned and our heads full of new ideas and impressions. Thank you very much to Miki, James, Vikas and Xavier for their hospitality!
