Biography

Hans M. Eppenberger was a retired Full Professor (em) of Cell Biology. He was born on June 20th, 1936, in Basel. He studied Biology at the University of Basel where he also got his PhD in 1962. He did his dissertation work at the Institute of Medical Chemistry of the University of Bern. After a 15 month postdoctoral period at Harvard Medical School in Boston ( Prof. E. Knox ) he worked as Research Associate ( Prof. N.O. Kaplan) at the Biochemistry Dept. of Brandeis University, where he mainly did research on the biochemistry of creatine kinase isoenzymes. He returned to Switzerland where he first became Chargé de Cours at the University of Neuchâtel. 1970 he was appointed to the ETH Zurich and 1975 promoted to Full Professor of Cell Biology. 1978 he was Visiting Professor at UCSD in La Jolla, CA USA and 1991 Special Science Counsellor in San Francisco, CA USA. He was awarded the Honorary Degree of Medicine of the University of Umea, Sweden, in 1990. He has been member of numerous commitees e.g. the Research Council of the SNF. 2001 he was elected Ombudsman of the ETH Zurich.

After retirement, he did not completely left the field of basic research in cardiology and he has been serving as advisor in basic science of cardiology in Switzerland and abroad. Lately, he was Chairman of the Working Group on Cellular Biology of the Heart of the European Soc. of Cardiology ( ESC ) and helped organizing workshops and symposia in the field.