Our Amazing Team
Prof. Dr. Emma Slack
Group Leader
Emma is a British/Swiss scientist who trained in Cambridge, London, Hamilton (Ontario) and Bern before joining the ETH Zürich. She is now a Professor of Mucosal Immunology at the Department of Health Sciences and Technology, as well as at the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, at the University of Oxford. She believes that difficult scientific problems, like understanding how the immune system in the intestine can influence microbiome composition and function, require a creative team of individuals collaborating closely across disciplines to solve them. These brilliant scientists need a safe, happy space to push the boundaries of knowledge, where they know that we are all there to support each other. So, while she still likes to get into the lab and get involved, she is also committed to leading a research group that reflects these values.
Suwannee Ganguillet
PhD Student
After completing a Bachelor in Biology at the University of Lausanne, Suwannee continued her studies at ETH Zurich, where she joined the Mucosal Immunology group for her Master's Thesis. After briefly exploring the industry-side of research on the microbiota in a pharmaceutical company, she is now back in the lab to conduct her Ph.D.
Elisa Cappio Barazzone
PhD Student
Elisa obtained her BSc degree in Biological Sciences from the University of Turin and her MSc degree in Molecular Biosciences from the University of Heidelberg. She then joined Emma's group for her PhD, working on a Botnar Research Centre for Child Health project aimed at developing microbiota engineering tools for the treatment of inborn errors of metabolism.
Candace Kim
Master Student
Having completed her Bachelor's degree at Ghent University, Candace joined the Hausmann group in the slack lab for her semester project as part of her Master's degree at ETH Zurich. Her project focuses on investigating the effects of microbiota on epithelial phenotypes in the colon.
Moana Meroni
Apprentice
Moana is doing an apprenticeship as a biology laboratory technician at the ETH Zurich. She is in the first year of her apprenticeship and spent the first six months acquiring basic knowledge in the teaching lab. Moana joined the Slack group in January and supports Selma and Christoph in their work, where she carries out PCRs independently, inserts ‘knock outs’ into E.coli bacteria or helps with the production of the vaccine against salmonella diseases.
Sharon Dreier
Technician
Before joining the Slack lab, Sharon studied Biotechnology and worked as an associate scientist in the field of environmental microbiology. Her current focus is the purification of capsular polysaccharides from E.coli for next generation vaccine production.
Dr. Yagmur George Turgay
Senior Scientist
Yagmur studied biochemistry in Frankfurt, Germany, before completing his PhD at the Institute of Biochemistry at ETH Zürich. After having worked in a biotech company developing glycodesigned antibodies, he joined Emma’s lab as a senior scientist. In his current role he is interested in modalities of antibody-glycan interactions for the development of oral vaccines.
Selma Aslani
Lab Manager / Technical Specialist
Selma studied Health Sciences and Technology at ETH Zurich. After her graduation she worked as a research associate in the pharmaceutical industry. In 2021 she re-joined the lab as a technical specialist for oral vaccine production and took over the role of lab manager.
Dr. Julian Harrison
Senior Scientist
Julian obtained his PhD at the University of Wollongong before moving to the Zenobi group at ETH Zurich. He joined the Slack group in 2024, where his research focuses on the application of various mass spectrometry techniques, such as native mass spectrometry, to help develop better vaccines, as well as methods for bacterial detection and metabolomics.
Dr. Annika Hausmann
SNSF Ambizione Group Leader
Annika studied Molecular Medicine in Bonn and Freiburg (DE). She trained in Zürich (CH) and Copenhagen (DK) in mucosal immunology, host-microbe interactions and epithelial repair mechanisms in intestinal inflammation. Annika is fascinated by how our intestinal mucosa manages to maintain a stable relation with commensal microbes, while protecting us against enteropathogen infections at the same time. Annika´s Epithelium-Microbiota Crosstalk subgroup joins the Mucosal Immunology lab in Fall 2024.
Niina Ruoho
Technician
Before joining the mucosal immunology group, Niina studied environmental sciences and worked as a research technician at the University of Helsinki. She enjoys the international & collegial atmosphere of the group and is fascinated by the connection between microbiomes and health. In her freetime Niina enjoys exploring the great Swiss outdoors (as long as it’s safe) and filling her apartment with succulents.
Dr. Sebastian Hummel
Postdoctoral Researcher
Sebastian is a trained mathematician with a BSc and MSc from TU München and a PhD from Bielefeld University. Prior to joining the lab, he worked at UC Berkeley on probability theory, population genetics, and immunology. Together with Markus Arnoldini he develops a mathematical model to identify parameter ranges that enable cooperation among gut bacteria, with the goal of informing targeted microbiota engineering.
Cheickna Diawara
PhD Student
Cheickna is a Malian/German PhD student who trained at Goethe-University Frankfurt (BSc) and at ETH Zurich (MSc). His background is in microbiology, immunology and biochemistry. He is passionate about public health in low-income countries and investigates the role of secretory IgA in combating bacterial gut infections.
Dr. Erick Sanchez Salguero
Postdoctoral Researcher
Erick's MSc and PhD research have been focused on B cell biology and characterisation, antibody production, specificity evaluation and microbiota composition analyses. He joined the Slack group as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Oxford. He is working on two main projects: 1) Studying the influence of bacteriophage abundance on IgA priming in the gut lumen using an E. coli K1-like bacteria model and exploring the consequences of phage-modulated immune responses on bacteria multidrug resistant and 2) Establishing a rapid assay to determine the amount of lipopeptides required to give activation of 50% of cells in a blood or PBMC-based assay to study TLR1/2/6 sensitivity linked to asthma subtypes.
Dr. Elisabetta Cacace
Postdoctoral Researcher
Elisabetta Cacace is a shared postdoctoral fellow between the groups of Emma Slack and Shinichi Sunagawa at ETH Zurich since 2023. She obtained her MD and MSc from the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna in Pisa, Italy, and her PhD from EMBL Heidelberg. She currently focuses on host-commensal interactions, using a combination of computational and experimental approaches to study nitrogen metabolism in the human gut microbiome.
Etienne Hösli
Master Student
Etienne obtained his Bachelor degree at UNIL and is doing a Master in Immunology and Microbiology at ETH Zurich. He joined the Slack lab in September 2024 for his second semester project and will continue working on the BRCCH project for his Master’s thesis under the supervision of Elisa and Mateusz.
Dr. Tim Keys
Junior Group Leader
Tim studied in Brisbane and worked at the Institute for Glycomics on the Gold Coast (Australia) and the Hannover Medical School (Germany) before joining the Institute of Microbiology at the ETH Zürich. His research projects cover the intersections of protein biochemistry, enzyme engineering, microbial glycan biosynthesis and synthetic biology. In 2020, Tim joined the Mucosal Immunology lab as junior group leader.
Dr. Louise Larsson
Postdoc
Louise completed her M.Sc. in Biotechnology at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden before moving to Switzerland in September 2020 to pursue her PhD. As a part of the Microbiota Engineering Project, she tried to develop tools for precise engineering of the gut microflora. After completion of her PhD she now continues in the lab as a postdoc working with Baxiva to develop a vaccine against urinary tract infections caused by E.coli.
Dr. Sarah Woodward
Postdoctoral Researcher
Sarah is a Canadian microbiologist and science communicator specializing in infection ecology. She earned a PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of British Columbia (Canada), studying how pathogenic microbes sense and respond to regional gut barriers and signals. Afterward, Sarah worked at the BC Centre for Disease Control to explore cross-reactive immunity to endemic coronaviruses and SARS-CoV-2. Her current work in the Oxford Slack group focuses on the impacts of antibody cross-reactivity on gut community ecology and vaccine immunogenicity.
Dr. Giorgia Greter
Pioneer Fellow
Giorgia is a Swiss/Italian postdoctoral researcher who recently finished her PhD in the Slack Lab, studying microbe-host interactions in the gut. She is currently working as a Pioneer Fellow in the development of a biotech startup, Baxiva. She aims to commercialize a next-gen vaccine technology to prevent bacterial pathogenic infections.
Dr. Markus Arnoldini
Senior Assistant
Markus wants to understand how the ecology of the gut microbiota and host physiology influence each other, and how we can use this understanding to improve health outcomes. He trained at ETH Zürich and UC San Diego in evolutionary microbiology/quantitative biology.
Mateusz Fido
PhD Student
Mateusz graduated from the University of Warsaw (BSc and MSc) in molecular biophysics, with a background in engineering nucleic acids and 5’ mRNA cap analogs. He is a shared PhD student between the Slack and Zenobi groups. Specialized in mass spectrometry and research software development, working on several metabolomics projects investigating the complex gut microbiota-host relationships.
Nimisha Khurana
PhD Student
After completing her Bachelor's in Biochemistry at the University of Delhi and a Master’s in Molecular Biosciences (Cancer Biology) at the University of Heidelberg and DKFZ, Nimisha joined the Hausmann and Slack groups for her PhD. Her research focuses on the complex interactions between the gut microbiome, host epithelial cells, and the immune system. Using advanced in vitro co-culture models such as organoids, and in vivo approaches, her project aims to uncover how these interactions contribute to conditions like inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and other related disorders.
Lisa Petukhov
Master Student
Lisa is Master‘s student from ETH Zurich. She is currently conducting her Master‘s thesis project in the Slack Group at the University of Oxford under the supervision of Sarah. Together, they are investigating the impact of IgA cross-reactivity on gut ecology and vaccine immunogenicity.
Nicola Realini
PhD Student
After completing a Bachelor's degree at the University of Lausanne and a Master's degree at ETH Zurich, Nicola joined the Hausmann subgroup in the Slack Lab to conduct his doctoral studies. His project focuses on the complex interactions among the intestinal epithelium, microbiota, and immune system, with particular emphasis on the mechanisms of antigen sampling within this context.
Tom Kloter
PhD Student
Tom is a swiss PhD student who completed his Bachelor and Master degree at ETH Zurich. After a year of brain tumor research at the Children's Hospital Zurich, he returned to ETH to pursue his doctoral studies in the mucosal immunology group. His project focuses on elucidating the mechanism behind surface antigen focusing in bacterial infection of the gastrointestinal tract and the lung.
