Prof. Dr. Michelle Frei
Additional information
Research area
Michelle Frei’s research lies in the interdisciplinary area between Chemistry and Biology. Her aim is to develop chemically inspired tools to visualize and investigate complex cellular processes such as signal transduction and metabolism. She primarily focuses on the development of new fluorescent reporters and biosensors that can be paired with advanced fluorescence microscopy.
Michelle Frei studied Chemistry at ETH Zurich where she obtained a BSc degree in 2014 and her MSc under the supervision of Prof François Diederich in 2015. Michelle then pursued her PhD in the lab of Prof. Kai Johnsson at EPF Lausanne and the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg (2016-2020). During this time, she was also a visiting scientist at the Advanced Light Microscopy Facility at EMBL, Heidelberg. Her dissertation, focusing on new chemical tools for advanced fluorescence microscopy, was awarded with the EPFL Thesis Distinction and the Prix Schläfli in Chemistry 2023. Funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), Michelle carried out postdoctoral research at the University of California San Diego in the group of Prof. Jin Zhang (2021-2024). In 2023 Michelle was appointed as Tenure Track Assistant Professor of Chemical Biology and Molecular Imaging in the Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences.