Thesis Defenses

Upcoming thesis defenses by PhD candidates of the GCB are announced here one week ahead of the defense date.

Thesis Defenses by PhD Candidates

Katharina Bacher

IFIK, Medical Faculty

«Influence of the FUT2 Secretor status in correlation with Human Milk Oligosaccharides on the host airway microbiota and colonization duration of Streptococcus pneumoniae.»

Supervisor:  : Prof. Dr. Markus Hilty,

Title: «PhD in Biomedical Sciences»

Date of Thesis Defense: Friday, January 30, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Vincent Lucien Paul Rapp

DBMR, Medical Faculty

«Functional assessment of the cis-regulatory landscape of TBX5, a critical regulator of mammalian heart development and disease»

Supervisor:  : Prof. Dr. Marco Osterwalder

Title: «PhD in Biomedical Sciences»

Date of Thesis Defense: Friday, January 30, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Martin Samuel Wohlfender

Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (ISPM), Faculty of Medicine

«Innovative approaches to integrate new data sources for epidemic surveillance»

Supervisor:  PD Dr. Christian Althaus

Title: «PhD in Computational Biology»

Date of Thesis Defense: Friday, January 30, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Nils Marc Joel Plähn

Universitätsspital Bern und Universität Bern, Abteilung für Diagnostische, Interventionelle und Pädiatrische Radiologie, Faculty of Medicine

«Simultaneous and robust multi-parameter quantification in magnetic resonance imaging»

Supervisor:  : Prof. Dr. Jessica Bastiaansen,

Title: «PhD Biomedical Engineering»

Date of Thesis Defense: Thursday, January 29, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Stefanie Arunasalam

DBMR, Faculty of Medicine

«Characterization of JAK2 Inhibition Failure Mechanisms and Approaches to Overcome Resistance to Therapy in Myeloproliferative Neoplasms»

Supervisor:  : Prof. Dr. Sara Christina Meyer,

Title: «PhD in Cell Biology»

Date of Thesis Defense: Thursday, January 29, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Symela Lazaridi

IBMM, Medical Faculty

«Re-engineering Biosensors from PAS domains»

Supervisor:  : Prof. Dr. Thomas Max Lemmin,

Title: «MD PhD (Doctor of Medicine and Philosophy)»

Date of Thesis Defense: Tuesday, January 28, 2025

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.

Martin Samuel Wohlfender

Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (ISPM), Faculty of Medicine

«Innovative approaches to integrate new data sources for epidemic surveillance»

Supervisor: PD Dr. Christian Althaus

Title: «PhD in Computational Biology»

Date of Thesis Defense: Friday, January 30, 2026

The thesis defenses are organised by the student and the thesis committee, as some Institutes throughout the University of Bern and the Inselspital have regulations in place for the capacity of the rooms.